The Communist Manifesto

The Communist Manifesto, originally titled Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei, is a political document by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. In the document, the two express their view that the conflicts in societies throughout history have primary been a struggle between classes. They detail many of the problems with capitalism, explain how these problems would be solved with their version of communism, distinguish their political philosophy from similar socialist ideas, and ultimately call for the forceful replacement of governments with communism.

Personal

Having spent my childhood being told that communism is evil and against everything American, and then spending my adulthood discovering that American values are pretty abhorrent, I decided to read this manifesto to see what it's really about.

Status

I do not own this document, but am reading it.

Review

Good

• The authors counter the argument "the elimination of private land ownership will eliminate individual freedom," by pointing out that only the rich own land, and, if only the rich are allowed freedom, it is necessary to eliminate it.

Bad

• The first section states many ascertains as fact without providing any evidence, such as claiming that class struggle is the primary source of conflict in a society (rather than religion, nationalism, racism, etc.) and that there are ultimately only two types of people in a society, the proletariat or bourgeoisie.

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