The Communist Manifesto (Penguin Classics)

Reading through the program one realises the distance that has been travelled since it was written. Some of the major planks are the Abolition of Child Labour, the creation of a progressive income tax and Free Education.

Perhaps one of its major weaknesses is that Marx was a person who tended to carry a grudge. Thus a third of it is devoted to attacks on some of his contemporary enemies and rivals. These disputes have so long passed into history they are incomprehensible.

The modern notion of Communism of course stems not from Marx but from Stalin and Lenin. Marx wrote at a time when the only democratic country in Europe was France. England, Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire all had limited franchises and Russia was of course an autocracy. One of the major reforms he battled for was the introduction of democracy. It was his belief that the implementation of his program would flow from that.

Following Marx's death his movement evolved into a parliamentary movement the Social Democratic Party. Communism as a modern political phenomena dates from 1917 when splinter Social Democrats followed Russia's lead and developed small conspiratorial parties who were committed to the seizure of power by force. Stalinism is an offshoot of this system and is a form of state terror aimed at ensuring the survival of unpopular anti democratic regimes.

Reading through the Manifesto one can see the basis of a system which was not only an effective for mobilising political movements, but came to influence intellectual debate for the next century. There is also perhaps a sense of a naive optimism which could not contemplate the sorts of disasters which were to occur over the next hundred years.


A Must Read   February 14, 2005
Susan Rial
16 out of 20 found this review helpful

If you have ever wondered about Communism and its true roots...read this.

Any Political Science Major should have read this book cover to cover.


Very important but see other Marx works for bigger picture   July 25, 2002
M. Cooke (Ireland)
8 out of 9 found this review helpful

What many don't realise is that this book sits at the top of a larger body of work which forms Marx's philosophy. Beyond the manifesto, Marx has been extremely influential in the areas of philosophy, psychology, ethics, aesthetics as well as the more obvious areas such as political economy. This book therefore is a consequence of a much more complex philosophical analysis of his times. In other philosophical discussions of Marx, you will rarely if ever come across references to the manifesto which puts it into perspective relative to his other, philosophically more important writings. However, as a polemic and a political manifesto this book is spot on for it's time even if Marxism, due to the subsequent events of history needs to be seriously reworked and comtemporised.


Good Primer for Future Marx/Engels' Writings   February 20, 2006
T. Frye (Athens, Georgia, USA)
12 out of 15 found this review helpful

The Manifesto is a short political tract, under sixty pages, but its affect on history has been enormous. We forget this today, especially after the Cold War, but if one reads into Marx's critique of capitalism, it still resonates even a century and a half later.

Of course, the tract is enunciated by a 19th century positivism that seems grossly misplaced in our postmodern, cynical world. Additionally, the rise and collapse of the Soviet Union and Communism (except in maybe today's North Korea and rhetorically in Cuba) has illuminated the weaknesses of the application of Marx's ideas. Nevertheless, it shows the costs of an unfettered market economy, in an industrial context, extremely well. Notice also the ten planks of the Communist Manifesto platform of action, to be implemented by a revolutionary state, which included some things we take for granted today--abolition of land ownership, progressive income tax, public and universal education, and nationalization of all railways, means of transportation, as well as abolition of child labor, and centralization of bank credit in a state bank.

If you're going to study 20th century politics and social movements, the Communist Manifesto is a must. It is a nice, more readable introduction to some of Marx's more obtuse works, such as his writings on German philosophy (The German Ideology), the 1848 revolutions, the 1871 Paris Communards (covered in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon and the Revolutions in France), philosophy (The Poverty of Philosophy), and the three volume set of Das Kapital [the last two of which Engels co-wrote and edited from Marx's writings and transcripts].


A quick-start guide to what Communism is really about.   December 12, 1999
David A. Bethune (Sonora, CA USA)
19 out of 25 found this review helpful

Marx and Engels were brilliant men who lived in a time and place not that different from our own. Overrun by commmerce, mid-19th Germany and the millenial United States have much in common: A huge and seemingly inexplicable stratification of rich and poor; A general malaise and widespread social displacement which lead to violence and mental illness; and a progression toward fascist ideologies (particularly racism, nationalism, & militarism) as so-called leaders rise up and claim solutions to our problems.

As historians and observers, Marx & Engels knew something many intelligent adults strugggle with today: That the world seems to have always been like this, and that our way of life (government and economy) provides no way out. In a cultish, group-think manner its only proffered solution to any raised objection is merely self-perpetuation. In place of education about its real goals and methods, it offers standardized national platitudes and smoke-and-mirror explanations designed only to further the ignorance of the general populace who must be lulled into cooperation. To improve education, we cut school spending. To decrease violence, we have wars. To help the poor, we give to the rich.

If you, like many people, are looking for an explanation of these events -- and a possible way out -- you owe it to yourself to read The Communist Manifesto. A careful reading and discussion with others, both aligned with and opposed to these ideas, will be most helpful in dealing with your own questions.

If, on the other hand, you are a steadfast capitalist, you also deserve a reading of the Manifesto, if for no other reason than to know your enemy. The ideas proposed here have been tried and have worked, but you have to look past the propaganda to see the meanings of Marx's words. The Soviets started out with his ideas, but were not able to really implement them. Reading the Manifesto will quickly demonstrate that. One society which was successfully based on Communist ideas (in fact, predating the word) is that of the native Hawaiian population -- a subject also recommend for interested students and detractors of socialism.