Bourgeoisie And The Proletariat In The Communist Manifesto

Relationship Status: It’s complicated
The Bourgeoisie and the Proletariat in Marx

According to Karl Marx, history is defined by class struggle. This epoch is one of an increasingly polarized duality of Bourgeoisie and Proletariat; simply defined as an antagonism between the owners of capital and means of production, and the wage-labors with no capital to speak of. They are a byproduct of Capitalism. Introduced in The Communist Manifesto as engaged in a violent and hostile war, his description continues both in the Manifesto and in Capital, to delve deeper beneath the surface layer and evolves into a more complete evaluation of their complex, codependent relationship. Instead of two oppositional parts of a whole society, they are, in reality,
“It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.” (p. 477). In doing so, the Bourgeoisie draws more members into its ranks, and creates increased competition within its class. Subsequently, the wealth becomes more and more concentrated and the Proletariat grows alongside it. The same Proletariat which is seen as a threat lying in wait until its self-awareness can motivate to an overthrow the Bourgeoisie in the interest of the majority. The Bourgeoisie “has drawn from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood” (p. 476), leading to its own destabilization. It is “a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, [that it] 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.”(p. 478). So while the Bourgeoisie struggles to maintain control of the Proletariat, it must also simultaneously fight to expand and face competition within itself. “The bourgeoisie finds itself involved in a constant battle. At first with the aristocracy; later on, with those portions
The Bourgeoisie in name only, needs the Proletariat not just to maintain status, but also to create status in the first place, and the observed struggle to ensure the persistence of the Proletariat leads Marx to the conclusion that the Bourgeoisie is no longer suitable to rule. There is a weakness in its strength, in that it must continue to revolutionize at its own expense; thus in order to persist the Bourgeoisie must feed the very threat to its own existence. “The weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism to the ground are now turned against the bourgeoisie itself. But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons-the modern working class-the proletarians” (p. 478) who grow in proportion to the growth of capital. As such, the Bourgeoisie finds its methods in conflict with its interests, and this determines that it “It is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery, because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him, instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society.” (p. 483). There is no choice but oppress the other class and to create its own enemy, or ‘grave-diggers’, whom Marx sees as the inevitable over