Karl Marx may easily be one of the most misunderstood philosophers in modern history. His work, The Communist Manifesto, is one that explains the natural progression of economies and governments throughout the ages. Yet, most countries, leaders and citizens believe that Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto as a call to action for all countries to switch from capitalism to communism immediately. That is not the case. Marx describes that throughout history there has always been an oppressor and the oppressed, and that the bourgeois and the proletariats are just the modern example of that. Capitalism is simply a natural progression from feudalism. As capitalism goes on, economies will to fall into economic depressions, each one worse than the …show more content…
He says that capitalism is the natural progression from feudalism, and that socialism will be the natural progression from capitalism. It is very simple when it is read properly. Yet, when it is not read the correct way it can become disastrous. For example, Russia was one of the first countries to attempt socialist/communism, but Russia was also most likely the last country Marx would have imagined would become socialist/communist. This is because at the time that Marx was writing his theories, in 1848, Russia was still a crude country that was still partially feudalist. But that did not stop Russia, and in 1918 the Communist party rose to power. The issue that arose was that the Communist Party either did not understand or did not care that communism was not something that could just be put in place. The Communist Manifesto was not an outline of how to overthrow the government and become communist, it was a prediction for how the natural progression of capitalism would go. Russia did not have the capitalistic boom that would eventually naturally lead to communism, and their communists were not proletariats that overthrew the bourgeois. Therefor when Russia attempted to put the communist practices in place, they did not work well because there was not enough money to make it work. There had never been wealthy capitalists from whom the new government could take money to disperse, and as a result, Russia fell into poverty. Russia is only one example of the misunderstanding of Marx’s ideas. Communist Russia is only one example of how misunderstood Marx’s theory of capitalism is. In today’s society, the Communist Manifesto is still somewhat of a taboo. This is not because what Marx outlined was evil, but rather because it is so widely misunderstood. Marx was not saying that the Communist Manifesto was a game plan, he was instead attempting to explain his predictions for what the natural progression