consider marx's communist manifesto as work of history. how did marx decribe the prior era of european history

Question

Do you agree with his characterization? What arguments might you make to complicate (or refute entirely) his depiction?

Answer 1

Gadds are 'we' still hashing out Marx after all these years? No truly what I am saying is who really knows Marx? Who has actually attempted to read his 'Manifesto' cover to cover. The book not edited exerpts ect. Marx's Manifesto has been as heavilly revised & edited as the Christian Bible!!

In truth what Marx said then can be applied now to 2007. A disproportionate amount of societies 'wealth' is concentrated in the hands of a smaller elite, often inheritating said wealth & position, and they share less of a tax burden & responsibility to the state, shifting the weight on to the shoulders of the masses, the lower classes.

Marx spoke for an era when people inherited titles. Circa 2007 titles are mostly passe but wealthy people tend to put their children through the same schools/colleges and the same circles of power thus ensuring that all but the most insolent or doltish of children will inherit a comfortable life.

Where Marx may have erred in arguing that a 'perfect' government could be created that would 'properly administer wealth, distribute that wealth. Human nature always trumps over good intentions. America's Founding Fathers, in particular George Washinton, a Southerner, and John Adams, a Northernor, intended America's Congress to be a group of 'gentlemen' who were successfull enough in their trades/jobs to take off one to three months at a stretch to tend to administrative business etc. They would be horrified at the results.
Horrified.
That is another topic - - - as to Marx untl more people 'understand' Marx it impossible to imagine anyone connecting his view of the aristocratic classes of Germany and England and France to the largely unseen faces of power today in America who can name five oil or pharmeceutical executives unless they end up on the news amidst the more urgent news about Paris Hilton catchinh crabs from prison bed sheets?

Good question by the way - - - such a break from multple choice rehash questions.

Pax------------------------

Answer 2

I don't think the previous answerers have understood the question. You are asking about the "prior" era, presumably prior to 1848 or earlier. Marx characterises history as being dominated by class struggles.
"The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.

Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.

In the earlier epochs of history, we find almost everywhere a complicated arrangement of society into various orders, a manifold gradation of social rank. In ancient Rome we have patricians, knights, plebeians, slaves; in the Middle Ages, feudal lords, vassals, guild-masters, journeymen, apprentices, serfs; in almost all of these classes, again, subordinate gradations."
The complication is ideological, mainly religious struggle. These often combined together, for example, in 1381 John Ball said, "When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman? From the beginning all men by nature were created alike, and our bondage or servitude came in by the unjust oppression of naughty men. For if God would have had any bondmen from the beginning, he would have appointed who should be bond, and who free. "
It can be argued that other things happened in history, but the most important things, such as democracy, were the product of class struggle. The steam engine was invented in ancient Egypt, but was not utilised until the 19th century bourgeoisie saw the need to increase productivity.
Read the whole Manifesto, but the section entitled "Bourgeoisie and Proletarians" is the most relevant. Marx himself described the last section as being of merely historical interest, but David Cameron might learn something of the nature of his problems by reading the section about "Feudal Socialism", about Benjamin Disraeli and Young England.

Answer 3

Marx was interesting. He was also wildly optimistic and completely misguided about human nature. Soho is very different today.

Answer 4

Boring.