Karl Marx and the Communist Manifesto

 

Source: Modified excerpt from The Communist Manifesto
by Karl Marx and Freidrich Engels, 1848 

Vocab

bourgeois: middle class – referring to the factory owners 

antagonisms: hatred between groups of people 

patriarchal: male 

pitilessly torn asunder: turn apart without caring, broken apart without mercy 

masses: large groups 

proletariat: Marx and Engel’s word for the working class 

limb: arm 

monotonous: boring 

knack: skill

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The modern bourgeois society...has not done away with class antagonisms. It has but established new forms of struggle in place of the old ones. Modern industry has converted the little workshop of the patriarchalmaster into the great factory of the industrial capitalist. ... They have pitilessly torn asunder the ties that bound men to each other, and have left nothing other than naked self- interest... Masses of laborers, crowded into the factory, are organized like soldiers.... They are slaves of the machine and the manufacturer. Instead of rising as industry progresses, they sink deeper and deeper into poverty.... 

Owing to the use of machinery and to division of labor, the work of the proletariat has lost all individual character, and consequently, all charm for the workmen. He becomes a limb of the machine, and it is only the most simple, most monotonous, and most easily acquired knack, that is required of him.” 

Answer question 11

Source: Modified excerpt from the Principles of Communism
by Friedrich Engels, 1847 

Vocab 

state: government 

institute: establish, create 

common account: common good, benefit of all

 abolish: eliminate 

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Above all, the state will have to take control of industry and of all the branches of production out of the hands of... competing individuals, and instead institute a system as a whole, that is for the common account, according to a common plan, and with the participation of all members of society. It will... abolish competition....Private property must therefore be abolished.”

Answer question 12