Comparing Marx and Toqueville Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Comparing Marx and Toqueville - Research Paper Example Manifesto of the Communist Party In the beginning of the manifesto, Marx details the history and evolution of the means of production from feudal to modern times. As Europe expanded through colonization and exploitation of its colonies, the feudal system collapsed, and â€Å"the Manufacturing System took its place† (Marx, 1888, p8). The feudal lords fell to the industrial middle class. Technology and trade continued to expand exponentially, and the industrial middle class was replaced by â€Å"industrial millionaires, the leaders of whole industrial armies, the modern bourgeois†(Marx, 1888, p8). The bourgeois, or new ruling class, controlled the means of production and had all political power. The modern working class--the proletariat--†must sell themselves piecemeal, as a commodity, like every other article of commerce† (Marx, 1888, p14). Their labor was unskilled and grueling. They worked under the eyes of the bourgeois manufacturer for minimum wage in fac tories. With automation came the blurring of the distinction in who was needed to work. Women and children could do repetitive tasks as well: â€Å"All are instruments of labor, more or less expensive to use, according to their age and sex† (Marx, 1888, p15). The Manifesto contends that all history is a form of conflict between oppressor and oppressed. What changes are the names and ideologies of the oppressors, but the fundamental dynamic remains the same. At the end of the 19th century, globalization was occurring, with capitalism as its driving force. Marx and Engels were well aware of this propensity: â€Å"for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it [the bourgeoisie] has substituted naked, shameless, brutal exploitation† (1888,p 10). With this in mind, Marx turns his attention to the bourgeois idealization of the family. By making into law its values and expectations, the bourgeoisie legitimizes the system of production (1888,p 24). The famil y in its ideal form exists only for the wealthy. It claims to be an ideal form. Yet, the bourgeois man is the only real beneficiary. As the property owner, and as the owner of the means of production, the upper class man owns both his wife and his children. The right of ownership guarantees him freedom to determine his own destiny. As property, the wife and children, although materially provided-for, have no real freedom. The proletarian is unable to live even like this, because he, his wife and his children must work in order to survive: â€Å"The bourgeois claptrap about the family and education, about the hallowed co-relation of parent and child becomes all the more disgusting [because]†¦by the actions of modern industry, all family ties among the proletarians are torn asunder and their children transformed into†¦articles of commerce and instruments of labor† (Marx, 1888, p 25). Marx advocates replacing home education with social education, in order to make an ev en start for rich and poor children. This â€Å"even start† as I phrase it, is a bit utopian, but it is the goal of Marxism to overthrow the unfair, elitist results of the capitalist system. The notion of complete ownership of the means of production allows the elite man to possess indiscriminately. (1888, p 25). As all women [ as well as lower class men] are his property, then all can be used. The proletarian men are only instruments to be used in the amassing of capital. All women, rich, poor, married, unmarried and prostitutes,