Karl Marx was born in Trier, Germany. The son of a wealthy lawyer who had converted from Judaism to avoid the increasing discrimination being exercised against the Jews in the region. Karl studied law at the Universities of Bohm, Berlin, but became increasingly attracted to the study of philosophy, in particular the ideas of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. He became a radial journalist and after being expelled from France in the wake of the 1848 revolutions, he finally settled in London, where he worked closely with his friend Friedrich Engels. In 1867, Marx published Das Kapital, possibly one of the most influential books in modern world history. Marx lived with his family in London until his death in 1883, and his grave can still be visited in Highgate Cemetery. The fusion of Hegelian philosophy, an empirical study on the state of society, blended to create the foundation of Marx's ideology. At the heart of Hegel's writing was a belief that any current situations contained contradictions, and that it was the resolution of these contradictions that move society on to a new level. This was a particular form of dialectic, resolution of contradictions by debate. At the core of Angles work, the condition of the working class in England in 1844, was documentation of the working classes subjugation under the power of the capital earning classes. This formed the core of Marx's materialism. The predominance of economic colonization, in this case the ownership of capital, for the resolution of the contradiction. The essence of Marx's thinking is often referred to as dialectic materialism, or in a simpler term, the class struggle. Marx saw power politics as a reflection of economic power, but the two were not synchronous. The dominant political class hung onto power, often long after its relative economic position had been eroded. And this was a materialist dialectic, and it was ultimately resolved by revolution. According to Marx, world modern society had passed through two such revolutions. The feudal system had eventually been swept away by the revolution of the bourgeoisie. The bourgeois society had developed through various trade, finance, and industrial revolutions and was now approaching its final stages. Capital was becoming concentrated in fewer and few hands, and there was an inherent contradiction in the system. The restricted growth of markets because of exploitation, and the increasing competition for those markets would contribute to a declining rate of profit. And this, in turn, would precipitate a crisis of capitalism. At this juncture, the repressed proletariat, where the real economic power lay, had only to rise up and overthrow the system. They would then seize and share the means of production, and install a communist regime totally free of capitalist exploitation. The revolution, is still not happened. And here in lies perhaps the greatest criticism of Marx's ideology in its simplest form. Capital survived its various crisis, technology advance postponed the falling rate of profit, and a proletariat continued to be deceived by false identities, as Marx would call it. And in those cases, where ownership of capital did part from the bourgeoisie, the lasting benefits of communism were hard to find. Yet, there's a way of thinking, Marxism lies at the basis of a whole range of analysis. One of, one end of the spectrum, by the writings of those who would look for the primacy, if not the exclusivity of economic factors in explaining social and political phenomena. This group will embrace many political economist. At the other end, are still the revolutionaries who still embrace the whole package, and continue to work for the inevitable revolution.
