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The concept of the bourgeoisie and proletarians
Compare Between Socialism And Capitalism
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Marx argued that there are two classes of people that exist in society, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The bourgeoisie refer to the upper class that own the means of production and whose central concern is the value of property. On the other hand, the proletariat describes the working class wageworkers in a capitalist society. Marx argued that the bourgeoisie simply exploited the proletariat, and the physical labor produced by the proletariat generated more wealth for the capitalist, leaving laborers under payed and machine-like. During this process, Marx believed that through this system of mass production, laborers were stripped of individual imagination and as a result, left individuals feeling alienated to their own emotions and erotic feelings in order to maximize production and wealth.
The idea of the bourgeoisie versus the proletarians brings us back to the distinction that Marx made between two social classes, those who are property owners and those who are propertyless workers. The bourgeoisie are the capitalists who own the properties and gain from the labors of those who work for them and the proletarians are those who are in the working class. These terms were first used in The Communist Manifesto where Marx spoke out about communism and what it would entail. A big concept that Marx was pushing to try and get across was that the proletarians outnumber the bourgeoisie, meaning that they could very well seize the means of production. He wanted to spark a revolution in these people by pointing out the flaws in the working
Karl Marx’s Communistic View The differences between bourgeoisie and proletariat, according to Karl Marx, was that the bourgeoisie owned property and controlled all aspects of the society and proletariats owned nothing and were wage-laborers that sold their labor for a wage. The terms bourgeoisie and proletariat do exist in the American society with slightly different terms and variations. The bourgeoisie would represent the upper class of American society; these individuals own property, businesses, and comprise a small majority of the population, much like the bourgeoisie. The proletariat would be representative of the middle and lower classes of the United States; however, the difference here is that the middle and lower class citizens
this idea through the creation of “religious and political illusions” to keep the working classes below them. Through the creation of these religious ideas and political ideologies the bourgeois formed the proletariat class, which happens to be the majority of the world. The proletariat class is viewed by the bourgeois as a group of inferiors laboring to gain a small percentage of capital to survive within the unfair society built by the bourgeois. Since the proletariat are forced to work for the bourgeois in order to survive they are only aiding the bourgeois in their quest of self-interest to expand their wealth, land ownership and political power. But as the modern bourgeois continue to modernize ways of producing goods through machines the pay wages of the proletariat workers will decrease because manual labor is no longer needed.
For Karl Marx the enlightenment represents the ideology of bourgeois society. “The thoughts of the dominant class are in every epoch the dominant ideas, i.e. the class which is the dominant material power of society is also the dominant spiritual power. The dominant thoughts are not anything other than the ideal expression of the dominant material relations, material relations are the dominant form of ideas before, so the reports that are words from one class the ruling class, ie what are the ideas of its dominance.” ~ Karl Marx*(1) Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno, associated with The Frankfurt school*(2) of philosophers that emerged from the Nazi State in the mid twentieth century followed some of Marxist theory but perceived omissions
Historically bourgeois class has always been the owners of land, by owning the land they are able to control the lower class citizens because one needs land to survive, Marx uses the example of the French Revolution in which feudal property was abolished for the bourgeois benefit. Then he continues to state that communism will support the proletariat in that communism is the abolishment of bourgeois private property. Marx elevates his argument by stating “modern bourgeois private property is the final and most complete expression of the system of producing and appropriating products, that is based on class antagonisms, on the exploitation of the many by the few”(pg 22) meaning that the system currently created consist of a small group of people forcing the majority to work from them in order to survive, the bourgeois would not have this power over the majority if they did not own the majority of the land. Hence the reason as to why the proletariat will eventually lean towards communism because it can be “summed up in a single sentence: Abolition of private property” (page 22)
Marx gathers seven criticisms towards capitalism and categorizes people as being either Bourgeoisie or Proletariat. The bourgeoisie are the rulers in a capitalist system, the corporate elite. The proletarians are the working-class people. In the first criticism, Marx points out the economic greed and inequality of a capitalist system, a system that possesses the resources to provide but won’t give because the owners of that system do not want to suffer profit losses. The second criticism states that the proletariat, the working-class are the reason the system have the necessary resources but are not given the privilege to own or afford the same, if any, luxuries the bourgeoisie own.
Karl Marx was born on May 5th 1818, in Trier, Germany. Mar was a smart man with the help of his father pushing him to achieve academic excellence in school. Marx studied law at the University of Bonn but was later on removed and put into the University of Berlin to study philosophy by his father. While growing up Marx was an editor for the Rheinische Zeitung newspaper. Marx later on in life got married to Jenny Von Westphalen and had two daughters.
Through the philosophy of Marx, he uses a method to analyze and critique the development of capitalism and the role of class struggles in these economic units. In Marx theory he finds that the conflictions within the classes are due to problems between the interests of the mistreated class of laborers employed by the bourgeoisie for the production of goods and services and the bourgeoisie, the class who own the production and take out their wealth through the profit that is produced by the proletariat. This class struggle results in a period of short-term crises as the bourgeoisie struggle to manage labor experienced by the proletariat. The conditions analyzed by both thinkers are very similar and are focused on the rapid development of global
In his Communistic Manifesto Karl Marx talks about the classes ' struggle, how thought history the subordinate classes have raised against the dominant classes and he foresees how the workers class will let a revolution against the capitalistic that will end in a socialism where the government will ensure welfare to the proletariat class. He also claims that this society will evolve to communism where the necessity of state will disappear along with alienation of labor from life. I think the society he dreams of is like a hypothetical or example of a society that is more inclusive and where all classes are actively participating, where they more equality among the people.
Marx outlined the origins of class and social inequality in relations of production. The commodification of labour power in production and schooling in a capitalist society has been seen as the root of alienation. Historical materialism assigns primacy to forces of production in the social structure in a sense that social relations are considered by Marx as the major criterion for the social superstructure to transform. The social system is said to consist of a material base and a superstructure which is based on social consciousness and ideology based on dialectics. The education system that is a part of this superstructure has been transformed into a selection and training mechanism for a highly alienated and bureaucratized work.
According to Edwards et al. (2006) Marx thought that within capitalism there would be an increased divide between the bourgeoisie class and the proletariat class in the future. The proletariats are lower of the two classes, the people who have to work for wages in order to survive. The bourgeoisie are the people in society who controlled and owned the means of production in a capitalist system.
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.
Bourgeoisie, which gains the power, defines superstructure “including all social and legal institution, all political and educational systems, all religions and all art” (Bressler, 162), and articulate the ideology which is based on profits of bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie ideology leads to alienation of individuals, especially proletariats. This bourgeoisie ideology creates the clash between the two classes. Marx supported the working class and their victory over dominant class. Marxism believes in providing equal opportunity to the working class as that are available to the
The bourgeoisies was considered to be the management or the upper class whereas the proletariat was the working class or labor class. In order to understand the idea that Marx’s was portraying it was very important to understand the two groups that he said were there in every system. A real life example in this context can be of an industrial plant where the means of production belong to the powerful group the bourgeoisies who themselves sit idle and exploit the no power group, excersining control, over them, this no power group is involved in the production of goods in return of which they are paid a minimal amount whereas the owners of these production units sells the same goods into the market and generate an optimal amount of revenue from the sale. A similar example can be seen in the case of landlords who are the owners of the farms. The labor class is the one that is involved in the cultivation of the land and are paid very less whereas the actual profit goes to the owner of the land who in this example is the powerful
