Karl Marx (1818-1883)

Who Was He?

• German economist, philosopher, revolutionary

• Raised as Jewish

• Poor in his adult life

Historical Period in Which Marx Wrote

• Victorian Period in England (1815-1900)--Massive Unemployment

--Population Increase (by Late Victorian Period, population increase slowing and British supremacy ending)

--Child labor

Marx’s Theory of Social Change

• From: Feudalism: lords, vassals, serfs

• [Industrial Revolution: fueled by steam and coal. Began in GB in mid-1700s]

• To: Capitalism: an economic system of selling commodities on a market for private profit. Fueled today by ____?

Marx’s Vision

• [Working People Unite!]

• To: Communism: abolition of private property to benefit the commonwealth: “wealth is seen as something to be allocated equitably in society, to be shared in common” (Brown & Garver 2009: 6).

Characteristics of CapitalismQuotes from The Manifesto of the Communist Party, Marx and Engels, 1848

(From Farganis, ed., Readings in Social Theory)

• Knows no boundaries: “A similar movement is going on before our own eyes. Modern bourgeois society with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.”

Characteristics of Capitalism

• Promotes concentration of power in few hands: “You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine-tenths of the population.”

Characteristics of Communism(selected)

• 1. “Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.”

• 7. “Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.”

Characteristics of Communism(cont’d)

• 8. “Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.”

• 9. “Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more equable distribution of the population over the country.”

Marx, the Conflict Theorist:Assumptions

• Society operates as a corrupting influence.

--it creates conditions under which people become greedy, exploitative, uncooperative

Assumptions (cont’d)

• Coercion is the basis of social order in which a minority of powerful people are able to impose their wills over the rest.

Marx’s Key Ideas

• Class PolarizationBourgeoisie versus Proletariat:

“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggle.”

(Marx and Engels, The Manifesto of the Communist Party, 1848)

Key Ideas (cont’d)

• Labor Theory of ValueUse Value: satisfaction of needs or making use of a given object.Exchange Value: the value an object has when offering in exchange for another object.Surplus Value (source of exploitation): value generated by labor that is above and beyond exchange value.