The Bourgeoisie; Resistance is Futile

Paper Summary:

In this article, the writer discusses the views of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels regarding the bourgeoisie and notes that, according to both of them, the bourgeoisie was the most dynamic group in human history for two reasons: it destroyed all obstacles to economic modernization, and it created capitalism. The paper explains and outlines the view held by both Marx and Engels that the main purpose of the bourgeois was to create capital and that it stopped at nothing to reach its goal and destroyed all obstacles in its way. Personal worth and morals had no meaning to this group.

From the Paper:

"The need to destroy all obstacles in the way of economic modernization was due to the need to create capital. The law of the division of labor is what divided society into classes, the proletarians being the working class, and the bourgeoisie being the ruling class. The working, or oppressed class, was given for their efforts only slightly more than what they needed to survive. This division of classes was needed only to justify the given conditions of society; to increase production and gain capital, sparing as much as possible in the process. The working class, therefore, was only meant to increase capital.
"Capitalism was not only a personal, but a social status. It took all members of society to make this system run. Therefore, capital was understood to be a social power. All parts of the machine had to be working accordingly to increase production and keep the system in order."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Engels, Friedrich. "Socialism, Utopian and Scientific (1877)." In Socialist Thought; A Documentary History, edited by Albert Fried and Ronald Sanders, 317-27. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992.
• Engels, Friedrich; Marx, Karl The Communist Manifesto. London: Penguin Classics, 2002.

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