Marxist Approach to History and Politics
Outline and assess the main aspects of Marx’s approach to understanding history and politics.
Over 150 years after they were first coined, The Labour Theory of Value, Class Antagonisms and the Means of Production are all terms which are central to the revolutionary ideals of Karl Marx and are still widely used and referred to in contemporary political thought. However, when considering how one can assess the Marxist paradigm on history and politics, there must be an understanding of the circumstances in which Karl Marx, one of the greatest political thinkers of the 19th century, was faced with. As many great political thinkers before and after him, Marx’s political ideology was partly shaped by his experiences, and is arguably the framework behind the inception of some of his greatest works such as the Communist Manifesto of 1848. Marx was born in Prussia at a time when a dynastic monarchy still maintained their rule and social woes were aggravated by the shift from Feudalism to an ever increasing Industrial society. As Marx continually moved from country to country, he began to develop dialectic political perspective and, after joining the Young Hegelians and becoming a political thinker, he began to write from a Hegelian viewpoint. His belief was that the method of thesis, antithesis and synthesis was to be best utilised when studying history, politics and the conditions of mankind in order to understand social stratification and emerging capitalism in the economic system. He also believed this method would create a concrete framework for society to follow in order to change the long standing socio-economic conditions of the past. As Marx himself claimed “The Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it” Marx differed from many prolific philosophers before him as his theories centred on Materialism and the relationship between the forces and means of production, as opposed to what Marx dismissed as “theories based in
Over 150 years after they were first coined, The Labour Theory of Value, Class Antagonisms and the Means of Production are all terms which are central to the revolutionary ideals of Karl Marx and are still widely used and referred to in contemporary political thought. However, when considering how one can assess the Marxist paradigm on history and politics, there must be an understanding of the circumstances in which Karl Marx, one of the greatest political thinkers of the 19th century, was faced with. As many great political thinkers before and after him, Marx’s political ideology was partly shaped by his experiences, and is arguably the framework behind the inception of some of his greatest works such as the Communist Manifesto of 1848. Marx was born in Prussia at a time when a dynastic monarchy still maintained their rule and social woes were aggravated by the shift from Feudalism to an ever increasing Industrial society. As Marx continually moved from country to country, he began to develop dialectic political perspective and, after joining the Young Hegelians and becoming a political thinker, he began to write from a Hegelian viewpoint. His belief was that the method of thesis, antithesis and synthesis was to be best utilised when studying history, politics and the conditions of mankind in order to understand social stratification and emerging capitalism in the economic system. He also believed this method would create a concrete framework for society to follow in order to change the long standing socio-economic conditions of the past. As Marx himself claimed “The Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it” Marx differed from many prolific philosophers before him as his theories centred on Materialism and the relationship between the forces and means of production, as opposed to what Marx dismissed as “theories based in
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