Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto

What Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto covers

Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto is examined in Unit A2 2 Option B, Political Ideas — taken instead of Political Power. It covers the Manifesto, its authors and its occasion, class struggle and the materialist view of history, the bourgeoisie as a revolutionary class, the nature of capitalism and its crises, the exploitation of the working class, social divisions, the other classes and class consciousness, the demise of capitalism and the proletarian revolution, private property and the ten measures, the nature of socialism and the role of the state and criticisms of The Communist Manifesto.

The 10 subtopics

Each one has its own page.

• The Manifesto, its authors and its occasionOpening sentence of the Manifesto, four sections of the Manifesto and happening in Europe in the year the Manifesto appeared.Open →
• Class struggle and the materialist view of historyManifesto's central claim about history, pairs of opposed classes the authors take from earlier epochs and two possible outcomes the authors give for each such struggle.Open →
• The bourgeoisie as a revolutionary classHow the authors credit the bourgeoisie with overthrowing feudalism, the constant revolutionising of production, the creation of a world market, the reduction of relations to cash payment, and why they treat it as a progressive class in its own time.Open →
• The nature of capitalism and its crisesCapitalism as the Manifesto presents it, claim that the relations of production become fetters and manifesto's account of the price of labour.Open →
• The exploitation of the working classWage labour and the price of labour as the cost of subsistence, the factory organised as an industrial army, the effect of machinery on skill and wages, the extension of exploitation beyond the workplace, and the claim that the worker sinks deeper as industry advances.Open →
• Social divisions, the other classes and class consciousnessLumpenproletariat and state how the authors treat it and class consciousness.Open →
• The demise of capitalism and the proletarian revolutionCrises of overproduction and the sorcerer who can no longer control what he has summoned, the growth and organisation of the proletariat, the claim that the bourgeoisie produces its own gravediggers, and the revolution and the ten measures that follow.Open →
• Private property and the ten measuresKind of property the Manifesto seeks to abolish, first four of the ten measures proposed in the Manifesto and fifth and sixth measures.Open →
• The nature of socialism and the role of the stateSociety the Manifesto expects to follow capitalism, what Marx and Engels meant by feudal socialism and petty-bourgeois socialism.Open →
• Criticisms of The Communist ManifestoMax Weber's challenge to the materialist account of history, conservative criticism of the ten measures and feminist criticism of the Manifesto.Open →

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Take Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto further

The same content, four other ways.

Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   When and for whom was The Communist Manifesto written?

   Model answer

   The Communist Manifesto was written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and published in London in February 1848. Marx and Engels wrote it as the programme of the Communist League, which had commissioned a statement of its aims.

2. 2

   State the opening sentence of the Manifesto.

   Model answer

   Marx and Engels open by declaring that a spectre is haunting Europe, the spectre of communism. The image is used to show that the powers of old Europe already treat communism as a force to be reckoned with.

3. 3

   Why do the authors say they are publishing their views openly?

   Model answer

   Marx and Engels argue that communism is denounced everywhere as a menace while nobody has stated what communists actually want. The Manifesto is offered as an open declaration to replace the nursery tale of the spectre with a published programme.

4. 4

   Name the four sections of the Manifesto.

   Model answer

   The four sections are Bourgeois and Proletarians, Proletarians and Communists, Socialist and Communist Literature, and Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties.

5. 5

   What was happening in Europe in the year the Manifesto appeared?

   Model answer

   The Manifesto was published just as revolutions broke out across much of Europe in 1848, including in France, the German states, Italy and the Habsburg lands. The uprisings were suppressed within about a year, which shaped the later course of Marx's thinking.

6. 6

   Who was Friedrich Engels and what did he contribute?

   Model answer

   Engels was the son of a German textile manufacturer with mills in Manchester, and he collaborated with Marx from 1844 onwards. Engels drafted an earlier catechism-style version of the programme and supplied first-hand knowledge of industrial conditions from his study of the working class in England.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto revision questions

What does Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto cover in CCEA A-Level Government and Politics?

10 subtopics: the manifesto, its authors and its occasion, class struggle and the materialist view of history, the bourgeoisie as a revolutionary class, the nature of capitalism and its crises, the exploitation of the working class, social divisions, the other classes and class consciousness, the demise of capitalism and the proletarian revolution, private property and the ten measures, the nature of socialism and the role of the state and criticisms of the communist manifesto. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.

How is Political Ideas: Marx and Engels, the Communist Manifesto organised?

By the CCEA 4830 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.