Karl Marx 6 Essay, Research Paper
According to the philosopher Karl Marx, the capitalist system carried within itself the seeds of its own destruction. One day, he predicted, a violent revolution would eliminate all social classes and result in a society of plenty for all. Marx believed history was moving inevitably toward a goal. But for Marx this goal was purely economic, the result of a struggle between industrial workers and owners.
In his writings, Marx argued that the true cost of any product is the labor employed in building it. But the factory owner, he said, doesn’t labor to create a product; he just buys the labor and raw materials and sells the resulting product. Although laborers contributed the full value of the product, Marx said, factory owners sold the product for more than they paid their workers. Therefore, he said, the difference was stolen from the workers.
Owners, he predicted, would increase their profits by paying their workers as little as possible, so workers would be increasingly impoverished. Eventually the wealth of the owners and poverty of the workers would lead to a revolution. But Karl Marx was wrong; conditions in England did not cause the proletariat (working class) to rise up and kill the bourgeoisie (prosperous middle class). Because life overall improved for the workers, there was no need for them to rise up and fight.
During the 1800s, Parliament gradually passed a series of social and economic reforms. Many laws were designed to help the men, women, and children whose labor supported the new industrial society. (World History, p 611) many of the new laws included free trade, the abolition of slavery, and a new criminal justice system. However, the major reforms were ones that included better working conditions, health conditions, and education. For example, in 1842, mine owners were forbidden to employ women or children under the age of ten. The government also regulated safety conditions in factories. Trade unions were also made legal, and these unions were now able to press for other laws to further improve the lives of the working class.
After universal male suffrage was granted in 1867, in the early 1900s, Liberals in the House of Commons pressed ahead with social reforms. Finally in 1911, a Liberal government passed measures to restrict the power given to the House of Lords. In the early 1920s, Britain began to pass social welfare laws. They protected workers with accident, health, and unemployment insurance as well as old-age pensions. (World History p 612)
After looking at all the reforms made by Britain, one can understand how the working conditions and overall lives improved for the working class. And it is because of these reforms that the proletariat found no need to rise up and kill the bourgeoisie, ultimately, disproving Karl Marx s theory.