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How Did Karl Marx View Capitalism

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Karl Marx: The Socialistic View Karl Marx was born in 1818 in present day Germany. He attended Bonn University where he graduated with his degree in law and then later attended the University of Berlin to study Philosophy and Literature. Karl was very interested but also against capitalism. He believed that the idea of capitalism lead to the wealthy becoming better off and the poor only becoming poorer. Karl founded the idea of Marxism which is “the idea of a materialistic world, where the wealthy are in power over the poor, and the government is in tight control over people and property.” Marx believed that without this structure the capitalistic view would create a classless society. This led him to become very interested
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Marx believed in everyone having enough to live off of and also being paid for the work they do. Marx did not want people to become rich off of others labor like many business owners did in factories. However, in the second image we see a clip from the video “China’s Rich Kids Living Large in America”.

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Karl Marx developed his theories about socialism in the 1800’s. Although Marx’ had written so much about capitalism so long ago he foresaw the increasing gap between the rich and poor. Even in the United States the worlds richest country, the capitalist system continually exploits the working class which causes the gap to become greater and greater which causes an increase in social inequality. Marx is seen as one of the three founders of the social sciences along with Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. His contributions to sociology include the framework of dialectical materialism and separation between social classes of people or a conflict perspective.

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Karl Marx was born May 5th 1818 in Germany. The economic ideas of Karl Marx were specifically that he did not believe in people having great ideas to change the economy but rather that all people needed was to be able to live a decent life, meaning that they had food to eat and a home. For Karl Marx the economic system had to be equal values, and therefore eradicating classes. Therefore arises Communism, which is the defined by the Chambers Concise Dictionary (2009) as “A political ideology advocating a classless society, the abolition of private ownership, and collective ownership by the people of all sources of wealth and production.” The ideas of Karl Marx were adopted in many countries across the globe for example the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Russia) that existed from 1922 to 1991 when the idea of socialism and communism failed and

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The ideology developed at the time when people with a lot of wealth regarding land and money were being given high status in the society, and it is believed that they had strong control over those that were considered to be of a lower class ( Last 88) . So, Marx viewed society as a structure formulated depending on the way people achieve certain things for survival. Consequently, these obtained things relied on the infrastructure and this was regarded as an economic base that led to the capitalist system which was benefiting the rich people against the lower class. Thus, the system was composed of social institutions, for example, education, family, political, as well as a religion within the

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Marx’s ability to break down other ideologies and study the reasoning for their ineffectiveness, was another major source. Marx analyzed ideologies like conservative socialism, its downfall and why it couldn't maintain itself through communism to determine whether communism could really be effective under the stress of capitalism. History is used throughout and throughout The Communist Manifesto to valid and thoroughly explain Karl Marx’s arguments. Marx followed the evolution of capitalism after the feudal system and through the duration of the Modern Industrial Era to form his premises and based most of his logic upon those findings.

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Socialism in the nineteenth century was, in Karl Marx eyes, a transitional state between the overthrow of capitalism and the realization of communism. During the Industrial Revolution, Socialism was a big topic for debate because it was about economic equality and justice for all people in Europe. The main contributor of this movement was Karl Marx. Marx in the nineteenth century set the foundation of many ideas at the time. One of Marx’s writings was The Communist Manifesto.

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Karl Marx Karl Marx was a German sociologist who contribution to sociology is known as Marxism (Rubel, 1968). Marx’s influence paved the way to a new theoretical perspective known as conflict theory. Unlike Durkheim, this paradigm suggests that society has conflict due to specific groups struggling to obtain scarce resources (Lindsey et al, 2009). Marx looked at two classes, the bourgeoisie, also known as the capitalist, and the proletariat, also known as the working class. He stated that the economic structure is the reason for the inequality and that those who have wealth have the power to control society (Coser, 1968).

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According to Marx, there are two major flaws with Capitalism, the first flaw is the problem with surplus labor. By this, Marx means that the Bourgeois make money by paying their workers less than they really should be. It does not matter how much they are selling their products for, they will still make money because they do not pay their workers like they should be paid. The second flaw is the chaotic nature of Capitalism. Capitalism is controlled by the free market instead of by the state.

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However, it does not refer to removal of the property of the lower class as they don’t have sufficient amount of property. He claims that “there is no need to abolish that, the developments of industry have to a great extent already destroyed it, and I still destroying it daily” (Communist Manisfesto). The property of the poor is sake of maintaining them and not comparable to what the bourgeoisie have so there is no point in taking away their properties. It is rather removing properties of the bourgeoisie “bourgeoisie individuality, bourgeoisie independence and bourgeoisie freedom is undoubtedly aimed at. By freedom is meant, under the present bourgeoisie conditions of production, free trade, free selling and buying” (The Communist Manifesto).

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According to the InvestorWord website capitalism is defined as an economic system characterised by private property ownership where individuals and companies are allowed to compete for their own economic gain, and free market forces determine the prices of goods and services. Such a premise is based on separating the state and business activities. In addition to this, Adam Smith favoured laissez-faire in which government only regulates and protects the market allowing the private sector to control most market activities. At the present time, capitalism in practice contradicts the main foundations that it was initially built on and for this reason I am for the motion that Karl Marx was correct to some extent that capitalism is bound to collapse.

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He believed in opposition to that view that real freedom and cultivation of oneself could be found in the relation one has with others rather than their isolation from others to form their own opinions. Marx believed that society was prevented from freedom by the inequality of people and that the fundamental truth of a society and time could be judged by their capability to provide for human material needs. This leads to the rise of antagonism between classes. By creating a classless society of everyone earning the same this erases hostility and progresses human improvement. Marx also believed in the equality of the sexes as he saw all people as equals for the sake of progress in society and laid the foundation for socialist

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Writings of Karl Marx had formed the theoretical basis for communism and the continual debate against capitalism. Marx understood capitalism to be a system in which the means of production are privately owned and profit is generated by the sale of the proletariat’s labour. He considered it to be an unfair exploitation of hard work with alienated social interactions and purpose. I agree with Marx that capitalism is indeed unfair and alienating, because it concentrates wealth within a small group of people by exploiting the surplus value of workers’ labour, and creates an alienated workforce. Hence, this essay will first discuss the relevance of Marx’s perception of capitalism as an alienating and unfair system for the contemporary world, before examining the potential of governments to influence the extent of alienation and unfairness that occurs.

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Karl Marx was a German philosopher and economist in the 18th century. He is known for his book the Communist Manifesto that was published in 1848. Marx believed that a revolution of the working classes would over throw the capitalist order and creates a classless society. The Industrial Revolutions led to the proletarianization; his partner Friedrich Engels explained why the changes created by the proletarianization of the worker would develop into a huge problem for industrial societies. I do believe that Karl Marx’s vision of communism in the Communist Manifesto could re-emerge as a popular and workable philosophy of social, economic, and political organization.

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Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, social scientist, sociologist, historian, journalist and revolutionary socialist. Marx was born on 5 May 1818 in Germany and died on 14 March 1883 in London. Karl Marx is regarded to be one of the founding fathers of Sociology. Capitalism, in layman’s term means “an economic, political, and social system in which property, business, and industry are privately owned, directed towards making the greatest possible profits for successful organizations and people.” (Cambridge Dictionary, 2014).

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Class conflict, Marx believed, was what encouraged the evolution of society. To quote Marx himself, 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

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