The philosopher, social scientist, historian and revolutionary, Karl Marx, is without a doubt the most influential socialist thinker to emerge in the 19th century though he was largely ignored by scholars in his own lifetime.
In 1848,Carl Marx supported by Friedrich Engels, completed the “Communist Manifesto”. The Manifesto is divided into an introduction, three substantive sections, and a conclusion.
The first chapter of the Manifesto, "Bourgeois and Proletarians", examines the Marxist conception of history, with the initial idea asserting that "The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles"
The second section, "Proletarians and Communists", starts by stating the relationship of conscious communists to the rest of the working class, declaring that they will not form a separate party that opposes other working-class parties, will express the interests and general will of the proletariat as a whole, and will distinguish themselves from other working-class parties by always expressing the common interest of the entire proletariat independently of all nationalities and representing the interests of the movement as a whole.
The third section, "Socialist and Communist Literature," distinguishes communism from other socialist doctrines prevalent at the time
The concluding section, "Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Opposition Parties", briefly discusses the communist position on struggles in specific countries in the mid-nineteenth century such as France, Switzerland, Poland, and Germany, and declares that Germany "is on the eve of a bourgeois revolution",and predicts that a world revolution will soon follow
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