The Communist Manifesto: A Modern Edition

The reason I wanted to read The Communist Manifesto now is that I don't remember reading it in school and this current financial mess, called the Great Recession, seems at its core the result of greed gone wild, underpinned with our system of capitalism which seems to have in it the very incentives to bring on this excessive greed. So, I was hoping this book would give me some meaningful thoughts with which to further have clues to the way things might play out during this financial mess including the political ramifications. And, from what I do know about Marx, I suspect what happened here is something he had thought out, in a general way, many years before. The Manifesto and the book's foreword cover things like......1. 1847, Marx and Engels joined the League of the Just (renamed the Communist Party) with its object to overthrow the bourgeoisie with rule by the proletariat and a new society without classes or private property.2. 1871, Civil war in France - Marx defended it and it then gave him notoriety as a dangerous leader of international subversion and feared by governments.3. Over the next 40 years the Manifesto conquered the world and carried forward a rise of new (socialist) labor parties. None were called Communist until the Russian Bolsheviks. Mostly in central Europe to Russia. Small in SW Europe.4. When a major state (Russia) represented Marxist ideology, the Manifesto became a text in political science and still remains so.5. It was written for a particular time in history6. Marx and Engel's Communist Party was not an organization - more of a historical document.7. Two things which gave the Manifesto its force - a) the vision that capitalism was not permanent/stable, b) The revolutionary potential of a capitalist economy.8. We live in a world where this transformation has largely taken place.9. Capitalism can't provide a livelihood for most of the working class.10. There will always be the oppressors (capitalists - bourgeoisie) versus the workers11 The Bourgeoisie has stripped all occupations down to paid workers.12. The need for constantly expanding market for its products means ultimately global.- effecting even a world literature, cheap prices - will make all nations bourgeoisie.Eventually overproduction leading to barbarism because of too much civilization. The proletariat/workers become mere appendages and lose all character. Brings more collisions between societies and trade unions will flourish. The worker groups get bigger and more powerful through education provided by the bourgeoisie. Other classes except the proletariat will decay.13. Wage labor rests on the competition between laborers. Communists flourish independently of national borders.14.Communism abolishes bourgeoisie property, no big deal since 90% of private property belongs to the bourgeoisie. Small peasant property is destroyed daily by industry. Average wage of laborers is the minimum wage, just for subsistence. Education is rescued from the influence of the ruling class. Since family is a bourgeoisie thing affirmed by property, family is destroyed - children are transformed into simple articles of commerce and instruments of labor. Working men will have no country. Communism's desire is to abolish countries and nationality. National differences and antagonisms will vanish. External truths like freedom and justice will be common to all states. But, communism will abolish eternal truths like religion and morality - a new basis. Communism will raise the working class to the ruling class.15. Specifically, communism will:a) Abolish property in land and application of all rents to public purposes.b) Abolish inheritance.c) Confiscate property of emigrants and rebels.d) Have a national bank.e) Centralization of communication and transportation by the state.f) Factories and instruments of production to be owned by the state.g) Combine agriculture and manufacturing so there will be no distinction between town and country.h) Free education.So, I would say the Communist Manifesto, though really just applied to a time in history and times have surely changed quite a bit since then, but I would also say what it was concerned about also shouldn't be ignored when trying to understand the current economic stress we are in. Our capitalism, though obviously very successful especially in many respects, does show strain in the following areas, as Marx could have likely anticipated like a) the gap between the well-off and the poor and even middle-class has dangerously widened such that our political divisions reflect that and has turned more heated and split, making compromise among our politicians very difficult - hard to govern the country efficiently. b) He warned that the bourgeoisie (today's well-off) has been unable to effect the tools to elevate everyone enough, judging by our failing infrastructure, healthcare costs the highest in the world, etc. c) He anticipated the global impact, ever searching for the least cost workers, such that our manufacturing workers are left without jobs. We can even see this global force in our illegal immigration problems - workers from Mexico, etc coming here, somehow even breaking down our borders - something Marx apparently could see. I did leave off some other things in how the Manifesto was relevant now, in this short paragraph, but from the points, above, it can be seen there are others.In conclusion, I give the book 5 out of 5 stars. It is a short enough book and just its impact has been monumental in history, it is worthwhile to keep in mind as one tries to figure out what might come next from this Great Recession.

The Communist Manifesto is one of those classics which every educated person should read. I do suggest, however, that one have some knowledge of European history first. I first read this book as an undergraduate, and have now just finished reading this modern edition edited by Hobsbawm a decade later, and I got a lot more out of reading it the second time. Part of the difficulty with reading the Manifesto is the archaic language it uses (although this edition does have notes which explain some of that), but there is also the problem of not understanding historical references if you are totally unfamiliar with 19th century Europe.Perhaps the most useful aspect of reading this book is the authors' discussion of the various "socialist" movements of the time which stood opposed to capitalism and how they differ from Communism. Many of these movements simply don't exist anymore, at least not as distinct phenomena, but have more or less merged into various positions supporting the social welfare state.It is often forgotten that the revolution that Communists sought was not merely economic or political - it was social, and involved the destruction of the family, centralized control of education, and no limits on the regulatory power of the state. Reading this book makes that clear. Even where Marxist economics has been discredited, these themes live on with abundant strength.It is also imperative to read this book to with an eye to the laws of economics. Otherwise, there is no way to really understand where Marx and Engels went wrong. For example, the authors argue (p. 43) that the price of labour is equal to its cost of production, and (p. 45) that industrial development "nearly everywhere reduces wages to the same low level." This is a misunderstanding; the cost of labour is determined by the balance between the supply of labour and the demand for labour, and because the supply curve for labour (amount of labor available) is never perfectly elastic (i.e. supply of labour is limited), increasing demand increases the price - i.e. economic growth increases wages.On the same page the authors go on to argue that improvements in technology make workers' livelihoods "more and more precarious," an idea that was held by many up until fairly recently. We have seen in recent decades, however, that technology tends to increase productivity, and over time, increase wages.One key issue in the Manifesto which is very alive today is that of free trade - indeed, the authors argue (p. 38) that capitalism "has set up that single, unconscionable freedom - free trade. In one word, for exploitation..." This prediction violated the law of comparative advantage, which has shown over and over again that countries benefit when free trade allows each country to produce those items in which it is the most productive producer. Thus even while workers in the U.S. lose their jobs, they can transition to other jobs, per capital GDP increases and unemployment stays low.The key idea here is that Marx should be read not because one thinks that he is right or that he is wrong, but that his thinking, having influenced so many modern movements, is essential to understanding the modern political landscape. Even where he is wrong, reading Marx brings understanding.

Was Marx right about any of what he said? Who knows? Who cares? Just think about how beautiful those first words of the Manifesto are: "A specter haunts Europe." I've been told by German speakers that this can be translated as "A ghost walks through Europe," which is great too.The C.M. does a good job of capturing the feeling of isolation and alienation that one experiences in modern society. For example, "All fixed relationships evaporate before they can ossify. All professions that were once held in reverent awe are subjected to the relentless demands of capital leaving no nexus between man and man save naked self interest and callous cash payment. All that is sacred is profaned; all that is solid melts into air." This relates back to Marx's earlier work on alienation in The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 (which is also tremendous). THIS is feeling that you get when you realize that your computer, or phone, or self has been left behind the blinding pace of capital, and the C.M. captures it perfectly.Read the C.M. Don't worry too much about the actual communism, because that's actually secondary. Don't be influenced by other reviewers who talk about the horrors of Stalinism. If thinkers are really to be held responsible for the outrages that are commited in their name, then we should certainly, certainly burn the Manifesto. But if that's the case, we should start the bonfire with the Gospels.