Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto as One of The Most Authoritative Manuscripts on Politics

The Manifesto of the Communist Party is an 1848 political pamphlet written by German philosophers Karl Marx then translated into English by Friedrich Engels, which is recognised as one of the world’s most influential political manuscripts. This piece was written under the context of bourgeoisie domination, rapid social change, and revolutionary developments in production. Marx took an analytical approach to the nature of society and politics, and explained how capitalism will be replaced with communism overtime. This paper will demonstrate the connection between the Manifesto of the Communist Party and various aspects of the European culture since the Enlightenment: Romanticism, New-Rising Bourgeoisie, and State and Democracy. It will also show which part of Marx’s work strikes me as a reader most and establish a relationship between that part and one crucial aspect of European culture since the Enlightenment.

Romanticism and Rousseau’s Confessions is very related to the Manifesto of the Communist Party because they share the same passion for freedom and equality, and both put emphasis on men’s creativity. Marx wanted to build an utopian ideal society where class antagonisation and exploitation of individuals does not exist, reflected through him statement that “in proportion as the exploitation of one individual by another will also be put an end to, the exploitation of one nation by another will also be put an end to” (Marx, Chapter 3). His Communist ideals are well supported by reasoning under the context of his society, yet is also driven by his passions for “free development of each” and “free development of all” (Marx, Chapter 3). Marx’s passions echoes with Rousseau’s feelings that his love of liberty and freedom “rendered [him] impatient of restraint or servitude” (Rousseau, 4). Similarly, Marx’s notion that it’s unjust that the proletariats are alienated from their species-being since their work has stopped them of creativity can be compared to Rousseau’s emphasis on emotions and creativity as the key elements that connect humans to Nature. In that society, though many proletariats might not understand communism fully, but as Rousseau asserted that passions and emotions can be felt wholly before they are conceived or understood (Rousseau, 3), a great number of them must have felt the impact of the unequal treatment and is willing to make a change.

The main purpose of Marx’s work is aimed at convincing and emotionally appealing to the public, especially the proletariats, to take control of their own fate and unite against the rule of the bourgeoisie, which can be compared to the Republican’s actions in the movie Les Misérables. Throughout the piece, language is used by Marx in a very strong, assertive, and affirming way that calls for actions. For instance, sentences like “the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society”, “society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie”, and “its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable” (Marx, Chapter 1) appeals the pathos and inspires passion. Arousing and powerful slogans like “Working Men of All Countries, Unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!” (Marx, Chapter 4) are also use to serve the same purpose. Similarly in the movie, the Republican leaders made inspiring statements and slogans like “we are citizens of the Republic”, “we cannot abandon our Motherland”, and “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” to motivate and keep the followers. This reveals that the Communist ideals of Marx and his supporters back then are not only supported by reasoning, but further powered by passion and Romanticism.

Marx’s concept of alienation resonates with the new-rising bourgeoisie and Tocqueville’s Democracy in America. As Marx suggests that the proletariats are alienated from the production process since they do not enjoy working at all by stating that “as the repulsiveness of the work increases, the wage decreases”, Tocqueville questions what would happen to the mental state a man who who has spent twenty years of his life in making heads for pins (Tocqueville, Chapter XX). Marx’s arguments that the proletariats are separated from their natural creative abilities as humans can also be compared to Tocqueville’s opinion that “in proportion as the workman improves the man is degraded” and that the workman “no longer belongs to himself, but to the calling which he has chosen” (Tocqueville, Chapter XX). As Tocqueville states that the mind of the bourgeoisie is enlarged in proportion as that of the workmen is narrowed (Tocqueville, Chapter XX), it can be inferred that both Marx and him agree that the workman (proletariat) in a democracy become increasingly narrow-minded, dependent and degraded.

Furthermore, Marx and Tocqueville share the awareness that while the production process becomes far more economically efficient and the trading and manufacturing becomes more globalised, this does not mean everybody’s life improves along with these advancements. Marx is fully aware that while the “markets kept ever growing, the demand ever rising” (Marx, Chapter 1), the proletariats are not benefited because the “bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honoured and looked up to with reverent awe” and the wage-labour does not create any property for the labourers (Marx, Chapter 2). Similarly, Tocqueville stated that this new mode of production “impoverishes and debases the men who serve it”, and that “the manufacturing aristocracy which is growing up under our eyes is one of the harshest which ever existed in the world” (Tocqueville, Chapter XX). Even though Tocqueville claims that democracy and Bourgeoise bring about “the equality of conditions” and did not offer a solution, just like Marx he understands the social problems the bourgeoisie can bring.

Marx’s methods to achieve a Communist state and to eliminate class antagonism can be related to State and Democracy and also the Social Contract Theory. According to Marx, his intentions are precisely to do away with all forms of bourgeoisie property (Marx, Chapter 2); the bourgeoisie must sacrifice their property and their individual rights in order to reach equality. This can be compared to the idea of Social Contract Theory that people arrange themselves into a functional society by making a contract with each other to give up all or part of their individual rights to the proposed society. Marx’s wish to give the rights back to the majority, which are the proletariats, would seem to match with Locke’s idea that sovereignty should belong to the majority of the people as Locke states that “the majority having, as has been shewed, upon men's first uniting into society, the whole power of the community naturally in them” (Locke, Chapter X). However, Marx then makes the assertion that most of the power should be centralised in the capable hands of the state. He suggested the “centralisation of credit in the hands of the state”, “centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State”, the “extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State”, and the “confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels” (Marx, Chapter 2). Parallels can be drawn between his beliefs and Hobbes’s idea that the government is the head of the society and therefore has the sovereignty over the people, since they both assume the State knows what is best for its subjects. Marx, to a certain extent, justifies taking away bourgeoisie property and individual rights based on the Social Contract Theory.

The part that I personally find most striking was Marx’s progressive mindset and his open-mindedness towards change. He first asserts that “the bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations”, “has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”, “has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation”, and “has resolved personal worth into exchange value” (Marx, Chapter 1). But simultaneously, he also acknowledged the fact that “the bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce one hundred years, has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together”, that “it has created enormous cities, has greatly increased the urban population as compared with the rural, and has thus rescued a considerable part of the population from the idiocy of rural life”, and that “the bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation” (Marx, Chapter 1). This reflects that despite all the harm the bourgeoisies as a class was doing to the society, Marx is not unaware of the benefits and wonders they have created for the modern world. Therefore, it can be implied that Marx does not emphasise religion and the social relationship between individuals in order to convince people that the feudal way of life is better; he is not trying to make things go back to the way they were before the bourgeoisie. Instead, he wants to keep the beneficial aspects of the bourgeoisie—their machinery, factories, scientific innovations, and division of labour—but improve upon them by proposing methods to improve the relations of production. Thus, it can be deduced that he wants the society to continuously progress forward in a way so that while production and trade remains effective and active, no forms of exploitation and oppression occur.

Many aspects of Marx’s description of bourgeoisie’s relationship with the proletariats are similar to Tocqueville’s negative depiction of the new relations of production in Democracy in America. Tocqueville pointed out that in this new world, “no profession exists in which men do not work for money” and that “men clearly see that it is profit which, if not wholly, at least partially, leads them to work” (Tocqueville, Chapter XVIII), which is in line with Marx’s opinion that men became increasingly materialistic and motivated by self-interest. Tocqueville also mentions that between the rich and the poor, “their relative position is not a permanent one; they are constantly drawn together or separated by their interests”, and that the social relations between the two classes becomes more and more distant because “the manufacturer asks nothing of the workman but his labor; the workman expects nothing from him but his wages” (Tocqueville, Chapter XX) just like Marx accused the bourgeoisie for replacing all connections between men with the callous cash payment which caused alienation (Marx, Chapter 1). Furthermore, even though bourgeoisie was just beginning to rise as a class during that time, Tocqueville already made the early prediction that he expects there to be a large amount of inequality and oppression by stating that “the poor have few means of escaping from their condition and becoming rich” and that “the elements of which the class of the poor is composed are fixed” (Tocqueville, Chapter XX). His prediction eventually became the reality of Marx’s society, as Marx realises that inequality is an issue to be solved since can stop the society from progressing.

Despite the similarities Marx and Tocqueville’s work shares, they greatly differ in their perspective, context, and solution. Tocqueville, born an entitled aristocrat, has a very different perspective in comparison to Marx, who was born in an ordinary middle-class family. Tocqueville wrote his piece from the perspective of an aristocrat by constantly comparing the aristocracy to the new bourgeoisie class, their different notion of labour, choice of professions, and modes of production. As an aristocracy whom, under that social context, was witnessing the decline of his own kind and the rapidly rising bourgeoisies taking over as the ruling class, he felt very threatened (Chapter XX was literally titled “That Aristocracy May Be Engendered By Manufactures”) and frustrated, yet he was forced to accept and acknowledge the rationale behind this inevitable change. Marx on the other hand, wrote his book under the social context when the bourgeoisie class has already passed its peak and begun to decline. Consequently, due to his background, Marx is more open towards social change and constantly look forward into the future instead of indulging in the past in comparison to Tocqueville, because even when Tocqueville discusses the future of the manufactures, he asserts the possibility that the society will decline back into a system that resembles the past aristocracy. Fundamentally, Marx and Tocqueville are different in the sense that while one offers a solution for possible improvement and sees society as growing, the latter does not.

With so many parallels and comparisons made between Marx’s Manifesto of the Communist Party and central elements of European Culture since the Enlightenment, it is evident that culture builds upon one another and continues to evolve as new thinkers emerge. Even though not all nations became communist societies, Marx’s ideas are very progressive and his work definitely pushed people to be aware of their social conditions and encouraged many countries to develop more socialist and equitable policies.