ECON 319 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto, Proletariat
Document Summary
1840"s became a communist and had main goals to abolish private property and establish egalitarian state. History is essentially about class struggles, a cycle of bourgeoisie triumphing over the aristocrats and then by the proletariat. The first step is to raise awareness of the classes in society and foster a sense of revolution to fight for freedom. Harsh conditions fosters radicalism which is more effective than gradual reforms. Marx in his economic and philosophical manuscripts (1844) develops ideas on property, species-being, and alienation. Humanity is encapsulated through our labour; we live to work than work to live. The commodity is an object with use-value that satisfies human wants of some sort or another (328). The question is where does wealth come from or what gives us the right or how do we figure out the exchange value. How do you decide how much corn equals how much iron? (aristotle)
