Manifesto of the Communist Party

Karl Marx and Frederick Engels

February 1848

First Published: February 1848

Critical Book Report by

Muhammad Tahir

I:D 15005112004

The Communist Manifesto

Karl Marx and Frederick Engels

The Communist Manifesto was published in 1848 and presented in the Communist

League convention. Those days Communist league had little influence. Karl Marx and Friedrich

Engels's great writings had made their own views on socialism and their writings became a

standard text. More than a century it was one of the most widely read documents in the world.

The audience of this book is working class. Authors are quite successful to attracting

their audience. The purpose of Manifesto is to achieve two major goals first is to convert the

proletarians and their allies to Marx's version of socialism and second is to put the ruling class on

notice as to the revolutionaries' intentions. So it expresses both hopes and threats. This book is

worthy to read the psychology of the capitalistic world for the students as well as scholars of this

age. This is analytical, logical and systematic book with foot notes.

At the beginning Marx taunts his opponents saying they are terrified of communism

without understanding in the minimal what it is. Communism is such a threat, it must be

important, and worth understanding. Hence the Manifesto.

The Communist Manifesto commences with Marx's famous quote that "the history of all

hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles". Marx describes these classes in terms

of two oppositions, with one party as oppressor, the other as oppressed. The demise of feudalism,

has brought about a clarity of class rivalry Rather than many classes fighting amongst themselves

is increasingly splitting into only two classes: Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.

The business of the state is the result of a long historical process. The new discoveries

and colonization of the New World in the 16th and 17th centuries required new methods of

production and exchange. Because of the demand for larger scale production, the medieval guild

system gave way to new methods of manufacturing, defined by the widespread use of division of

labor and, with the advent of industrialization, by steam and machinery. It was the bourgeoisie

"modern Capitalists, owners of the means of social production and the employers of wage labor

who were the agents of these economic revolutions.

The emerging economic powers of the bourgeoisie led to their political authorization.

Bourgeoisie had come in the middle of the 19th century to control the main states of Europe. In

fact, as Marx famously notes, "the executive of the modern State is but a committee for

managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie". In the first half of the 19th century, the

bourgeoisie introduced an ethic based free trade and the rational, profit motive based economy.

Marx says, "Constant big changes in production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social

conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier

ones". This economic and social dynamism unsettles the boundaries of nations and creates

pressure and lead toward globalization, and "create the world after their own image".

Marx sees as the result of bourgeois economic development that rocked Europe in the

1830 to 1840. In response to these crises, the bourgeoisie either scale back their production, find

new markets, or more thoroughly exploit old ones. According to Marx, though, all this is for

naught as it does not treat the underlying problems which will create more acute crises in the

future.

The proletariat are the working forces of bourgeois enterprise, "a class of laborers who

live only so long as they can find work, and who find work only so long as their labor increases

capital". The proletarians are themselves commodities. According to Marx, this wage is the cost

of bare subsistence for the proletariat and his family. Because of the division of labor, the work

of the proletariat is assimilated to the great industrial machinery.

Under the bourgeois masters, the proletariat is in a constant state of antagonism with the

bourgeoisie. As the proletariat become more numerous and organized, though, members of the

bourgeoisie begin to realize that their class will fall and the proletariat will triumph.

Finally, the proletariat flared up rebellion, broke the chains which bound them to the

bourgeoisie. They condemn all the bourgeois laws, morality, and religions as supporters for

bourgeois economic interests. Marx concludes, "What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces,

above all, is its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally

inevitable".

Next chapter Marx starts by proclaiming that communists have no interests apart from the

interests of the working class as a whole. Communists are distinguished from other socialist

parties by focusing on the sole interests of all workers and not the interests of any single

movement. They appreciate the historical forces that compel the progress of their class and help

lead the proletariat to fulfill their mission. As Marx says, "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".

Marx considers that private property and capital is based on class hostility. Having linked

private property to class opposition, Marx proceeds to investigate both antagonists with respect

to their independence.

Marx points out that capital is a social product that is capital exists within some social

system. The result of this is that capital is a social power no personal or individual power.

Towards the condition of the wage laborer, Marx says that "the average price of wage

labor is the minimum wage. The proletariat have to absolutely dependent on the capitalist for his

survival. He does not acquire any property because his wage must be given immediately to his

own subsistence. Communists want to ensure that the laborer exists for more than merely the

increase of bourgeois capital.

End of private property means the abolition of bourgeoisie property. The freedom which

the bourgeois believe is underwritten by private property is a very narrow freedom, one available

only to a very small ratio of the population.

Marx also considers that a communist society would promote general idleness. Marx

considers that in bourgeois society those who work do not acquire anything while those who

acquire things do not work.

Communists are also accused of desiring to destroy the family. Because for the capitalist,

a spouse and children are mere instruments of production, like the machines in his factory. A

communist society would alter these relations, utilizing the educational system to end the

exploitation that women, children, and the vast working classes suffer under capitalism. This is a

self-conscious destruction of society, but only as a cleansing of the old in preparation for the

new.

On Criticism that communists wish to abolish countries, Marx responds that this process

is already existing due to bourgeois efforts to expand free trade. Such globalization will continue

as class consciousness develops across the proletariat of all nations. Marx even goes so far as to

predict that hostility between nations will vanish as class antagonisms. Class defines one far

more than nationality.

Marx acknowledges that the revolution will be different in different countries Marx

concludes the chapter by repeating his claim that once the proletariat achieve political power, the

final result will be a classless society. Abolishing bourgeois modes of production undermines the

continued existence of class antagonisms, and without class antagonism, the proletariat will lose

their own class character. As Marx famously closes the chapter, "In place of the old bourgeois

society, with its classes and class antagonisms, we shall have an association, in which the free

development of each is the condition for the free development of all".

Marx explores the evolution of European socialism up to his own day. Not surprisingly,

he charges all previous movements with theoretical and practical inadequacy while hailing his

own communist alternative as the best expression of a shared concern with the working-class.

Feudal Socialism was the earliest form of socialism. Aristocrats were its co-founders who

were repudiated to the rapid social changes brought about by the expanding bourgeoisie. Marx

opposes these feudal socialists for ignoring the fact that they were exploiters too when they were

in power. Most importantly, they had no importance in historical progress. They did not realize

that the bourgeoisie were their own offspring as the proletariat are the bourgeoisie’s offspring of.

Their primary concern was in restore the old feudal order. Marx also identifies feudal socialism

with Christian socialism, remarking that "Christian socialism is but the holy water with which

the priest consecrates the heart-burnings of the aristocrat".

Bourgeois dominance mainly divides society into two classes, bourgeoisie and

proletariat. There still exists a third class which constantly swing between bourgeoisie and

proletariat; the petty-bourgeoisie. This class normally assimilates into the proletariat class as

society becomes more urbanized and reliant on industrial production. Petty-bourgeois socialism

grows up this class, but holds up the standard of the proletariat. They do not observe that the

answer to bourgeois exploitation is to develop the proletariat into a revolutionary class rather

than to return the worker to the country and renew a failed feudalism.

German Socialism began as a response to French socialist literature. These early

socialists did not appreciate that the French ideas grew out of a social environment which could

not exist yet in Germany. Unlike the French bourgeoisie, the German bourgeoisie had merely

began struggle against feudalism and there was no proletariat to speak of. As socialism lacked

practical significance for Germany, German thinkers universalized the French ideas, raising them

to the status of immutable laws of human Reason, transcending the narrow concerns of any

particular class. Those who championed these ideas in the political area forgot that they were

formatted for a society different from their society the result of this premature up gradation of

socialistic values was a hardening of aristocratic resistance to the bourgeoisie. This has slowed

the progress of industrialization and kept Germany less developed economically than France.

While the political rhetoric of this movement has earned it many admirers, its lack of class

character and its decrying of violent revolution make it weak and ineffectual.

These were the form of socialism practiced by those sections of the bourgeoisie who wish

to reform their class rather than destroy it. They want to enjoy the social developments which

their economic and political supremacy has effected, but they do not want to accept the necessary

consequences of that development, a suffering and revolutionary proletariat. They struggle for

social harmony but refuse to realize that the exploitation of the masses will not end until their

form of society has been vanquished. To this end, they simply prolong the misery of the

proletariat and stand in the way of historical progress.

The first great expositors of Socialism and Communism (Saint-Simon, Fourier, Owen,

etc.) appeared very early in the bourgeois epoch. Accordingly, they did not fully appreciate the

character of the proletariat as the revolutionary class, the vehicle of historical action. For them

the proletariat was merely the locus of social misery, the class most in need of assistance. Their

primary concern was with the well-being of society as a whole and they directed their entreaties

to those who they thought could effect change, those already in power. Change was to occur

peacefully from above rather than violently from below. Their critical faculties, though, extended

to all portions of society and have helped the working classes focus their own struggle. The

visions of society that they propose, though, are Utopian to the point of being fantastical.

Notably, as class antagonism develops, their suggestions become more far-fetched and less

inspiring. They want to abolish class conflict without abolishing the conditions for the existence

of classes. At the moment of revolution, then, they become reactionary, resisting the inevitable

emancipation of the exploited masses for which they originally toiled.

In last chapter Marx summarize the political aims of Communism. He identifies allied

parties in various European states. They always stay focused on the long-term interests of the

proletariat as a whole. Marx claims that Germany is the chief focus of Communist interest

because while the bourgeoisie in Germany have not achieved victory over the aristocracy, the

proletariat there is more developed than it was when either the French or English bourgeoisie

won their independence. The result of this is that the proletariat revolution will arrive first in

Germany. Communists must support any and all revolutionary movements which advocate the

abolition of private property and advance the interests of the proletariat. As Marx powerfully

concludes, "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!"

The concluding chapter of the Manifesto is very short. It says little new and is meant

primarily to forcefully reinstate the communist's political purposes. Marx does, though, make an

interesting observation in predicting that Germany will be the site of the inaugural proletariat

revolt. This is interesting because it indicates that all societies need not progress at the same rate

in approaching communist revolution. The ordering remains feudalism, capitalism, communism

but the pacing is different. This is also apparent in Marx's insistence that communists raise the

property question always and everywhere. Marx's willingness to hurry things here might well

have influenced later Marxist revolutionaries who did not even await the arrival of fully

developed capitalism to liberate the masses. It is these people, Trotsky and Lenin in Russia, Mao

Tse-Tung in China, and Fidel Castro and Che Guevarra in Latin America, whom we most

associate with communism as they succeeded in bringing it to someone half of the world's

population. As the cold war has ended and the remaining communist states are slowly decaying.

Question is that Why study manifesto today? Most of the communist world has lost their

identity and communist countries like Vietnam and China have built market economies and

Korea and Cuba are just surviving, but not serving as a model.

There are several reasons that why The Communist Manifesto is still now an important

document. It has a certain intrinsic interest. It is good to know what the great ideas are which

have shaped history. Some people would say that Marxists so thoroughly betrayed Marxism that

the document can be used to show why attempts at building communist states failed: they were

never truly Marxist at all.

It is important to understand that Marx played two important roles in world history first

as a critic of capitalism and second as an advocate of socialism. He actually wrote very little on

the latter subject. Although a strong believer in the importance of building socialism, he spent

most of his time and energy on a subtle and complex critique of the capitalist system. This

critique is still very influential on many historians, art and literature scholars, sociologists and

others. There have been many neo-Marxisms which have been based more or less loosely on the

original ideas of Marx and which are widely discussed today.

Communist Manifesto is a document which makes manifesto the central ideas of a group

and individual. Although the organization for which this was written, was remained underground

for the reason that it was illegal. Marx always envisioned the socialist movement as open. He

always rejected secret conspiracies because his ideal of building socialism was envisioned as a

majority of class which could only accumulate the necessary momentum through an open

expanded campaign of education.

Engels was Marx's close friend and a great thinker and writer. He outlived Marx by many

years, and produced several volumes which are still influential. Marx was clearly the more

powerful thinker then his friend, but it may claim that Engels was the better stylist. Although

Engels may have been responsible for much of the eloquent writing in the Manifesto, because it

incorporates Marx's ideas and embodies some central concepts of what came to be known as

Marxism.

The terms "socialist" and "communist" have been defined in a confusing variety of ways.

When reading them it is always important to know what the writer means by them. For Marx

socialism was the more comprehensive term and communism was an advanced stage of

socialism. Socialism would prepare the way by nationalizing the "means of production" and

putting them under the control of those he viewed as the sole producers of wealth who are the

workers. He pointed out political equality and freedom is incomplete without economic equality.

Therefore this redistribution of economic power was aimed at extending democracy far beyond

the limits envisioned by earlier democratic revolutions. Social services like health, education,

and housing would be provided free, but people would still be paid wages according to their

work.

When all nations had developed socialist economies, they would begin to evolve into an

international communist society. The vision of communism was very similar to that of anarchism

viewed a stateless society in which central government had "withered away," local, ground-up

control of all affairs by strictly democratic processes based at the place of work, abolition of the

market system, no money, no buying and selling and its replacement by a system according to

which people would voluntarily work for the common good to the extent they were able to

understanding that they could receive whatever they needed for free "from each according to his

ability, to each according to his needs". National boundaries and governments having been

eliminated, war would cease.

Marx rejected the belief that such a society could be set up immediately as utopian.

People would need a long period of education under socialism to condition them away from the

selfish orientation produced by capitalism and toward the wider perspective necessary to create

communism. Many of his socialist and anarchist rivals argued that it was impossible to achieve

communism by passing through a stage which retained and even strengthened the centralized

state government. Marx used to reply that it was impossible to leap directly into communism

from capitalism.

The most common reply is that both are impossible because you cannot change human

nature. What Marx set out to prove was that not only had human nature changed many times in

the past. There is no such thing as a static human nature. Like John Lock’s Tabula rasa concept

Marx said that we are products of our environment, particularly of the economic system in which

we live. People living under feudalism are motivated by feudal motives and think them natural

and fixed, just as people living under capitalism are motivated by capitalist motives and think

those natural and fixed. Generally, in history people undergo what is called a "paradigm shift" in

values, based on an economic transformation. This is what he attempts to sketch in the first

section of the Manifesto. If people's values could be changed radically in the past, he argued,

they are certain to change again radically in the future. In a socialist society it would be nonsense

to say that people will always naturally tend to become owners of factories because such owners

would be as impossible, and such desires would be as irrational as the desire to own the Moon.

Although he does not address the question in the Manifesto, it is important to understand

why Marx believed an armed revolution would be necessary to establish socialism. He was

convinced that the democratic revolutions which swept Europe in 1848 had merely substituted

one tyrant for another. The bourgeoisie had replaced the old aristocracy as the rulers in law as

well as in fact. Their slogans were freedom and equality for all. He did not reject bourgeois

democracy because it was democratic, only because he felt it was limited to the bourgeoisie.

Economic power, not the vote, was the ultimate guarantee of political power. He was in favor of

using elections as an organizing tool, but he was certain that in most countries the ruling class

would forcibly prevent any democratically elected socialist government from taking power.

Translated:Samuel Moore in cooperation with Frederick Engels, 1888;

Transcribed:by Zodiac and Brian Baggins;

Proofed:and corrected against 1888 English Edition by Andy Blunden 2004;

68 Pages