MARXISM

Karl Marx, a revolutionary sociologist, historian and economist that published works
(with Friedrich Engels) “The Communist Manifesto” and “Das Capital” whose writings
came the basis for the body of thought and belief known as Capitalism.

Karl Marx was a German revolutionist and can be considered a philosopher, historian,
sociologist, political theorist, journalist and economist.

He was born in 1818 and died in 1883. He was a Jew in Germany.

Marx’s family converted to Christianity when he was six years old but he was never
spiritual, once referring to religion as the “opium of the people”.

He used his influence in the journalism sector to spread on his views.

Karl Marx can be considered to have inspired the Russian Revolution through Vladimir
Lenin.

Marx’s views on society, economics and politics fall into the term Marxism.

Marx believed that human societies develop through class struggle, that is the gap
between the rich and the poor. For instance, in capitalism, there is a manifestation of
conflict and that helps control the means of production and those considered as working
class. Labour is sold and the workers get wages in return for their work. This critical
approach is known as historical materialism. Marx believed that capitalism would
produce internal tensions and this would lead to its self-destruction and that it should be
replaced by a new system, which he considered to be socialism. He also believed that
the working class would develop class consciousness and this would lead to revolts
since they would have a thirst for political power. A solution to this would be the
establishment of a classless communist society. Marx actively campaigned for his
beliefs in an attempt to topple capitalism and implement communism.

Capitalism
An economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods,
by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and
the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market

Capitalism is an economic system where private entities own the factors of production.
The four factors are entrepreneurship, capital goods, natural resources, and labor. The
owners of capital goods, natural resources, and entrepreneurship exercise control
through companies. The individual owns their labor. The only exception is slavery,
where someone else owns a person's labor. Although illegal throughout the entire world,
slavery is still widely practiced.

In capitalism, owners control the factors of production and derive their income from it.

Capitalism incentivizes people to maximize the amount of money they earn through
competition.

Competition is the driving force of innovation as individuals create ways to do tasks

more efficiently.

Under capitalism, the proletariat, the working class or “the people,” own only their
capacity to work; they have the ability only to sell their own labor. According to Marx a
class is defined by the relations of its members to the means of production. He
proclaimed that history is the chronology of class struggles, wars, and uprisings. Under
capitalism, Marx continues, the workers, in order to support their families are paid a
bare minimum wage or salary. The worker is alienated because he has no control over
the labor or product which he produces. The capitalists sell the products produced by
the workers at a proportional value as related to the labor involved. Surplus value is the
difference between what the worker is paid and the price for which the product is sold.

Marxism, a body of doctrine developed by Karl Marx and, to a lesser extent, by

Friedrich Engels in the mid-19th century. It originally consisted of three related ideas: a
philosophical anthropology, a theory of history, and an economic and political program.
There is also Marxism as it has been understood and practiced by the various socialist
movements, particularly before 1914.

Marxism shares with other progressive social movements an uncompromising hostility

to all forms of domination — sexism, racism, and so on, but what marks Marxism out
from other progressive movements is that Marxists struggle always to overcome the
manifold forms of domination and exploitation in and through the self-emancipation of
the working class. Thus Marxism is Revolutionary Socialism.

There is no set of principles and beliefs which can be set out once and for all and
stamped with the name of “Marxism”. Marxism is a movement, and as such can only be
understood through a critical examination of its history. While this movement bears the
name of its founder, Karl Marx, Marxism is not a movement of followers, but it is
nevertheless a movement which is integrally concerned with an interconnected body of
theoretical and political writing which traces its origins back to Marx.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capitalism

How Capitalism Works Compared To Socialism and Communism, Kimberly Amadeo,

February, 2020
https://www.thebalance.com/capitalism-characteristics-examples-pros-cons-3305588

Encyclopedia Britannica. (n.d.). Karl Marx, German Philosopher. doi:

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Karl-Marx

https://www.allaboutphilosophy.org/what-is-marxism-faq.htm

https://schoolhistory.co.uk/notes/karl-marx-marxism/

Nissen, M. (2011). Activity Theory: Legacies, Standpoints, and Hopes: A discussion of

Andy Blunden's An Interdisciplinary Theory of Activity: An Interdisciplinary Theory of
Activity, by Andy Blunden, Leiden, the Netherlands: Brill, 2010, 346 pp., $141.00 (cloth).