Initial Impressions : The Communist Manifesto (1847)
“In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property”
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| Karl Marx and Frederick Engels |
In the first section of the manifesto “Bourgeois and
Proletarians”, Marx states that in “the history of all hitherto existing
societies is the history of class struggles”, it is the bourgeoisie (the middle
class) who were instrumental in
instigating the working class to revolt against aristocracy for economic gains
and not the other way around (at least until the time the Manifesto was written)
The next piece “Proletarians and Communists” has Marx
defining the role of Communists with respect to the common folk “The Communists
are distinguished from the other working-class parties by this only: (1) In the
national struggles of the proletarians of the different countries, they point
out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat,
independently of all nationality. (2) In the various stages of development
which the struggle of the working class against the bourgeoisie has to pass
through, they always and everywhere represent the interests of the movement as
a whole”, something in the likes of first among equals. These roles, as we saw
in history, were altered by despotic leaders who chose to tread upon the rest,
thus undermining communism through tyranny. Marx saw this in his own lifetime
and grew weary to the blatant disharmony among classes during the various
revolutions in France and England. I’m reminded of Orwell’s Animal Farm, where Napoleon, a pig and self confessed first-among-animal-equals tweaks the seven commandments to suit his whims.
The manifesto’s next segment “Socialist and Communist
Literature” is a critique on the existing socialist movements and how
Communism differs from them while the last section “Position of the
Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties” gives a
then current-scenario of the position of the Communists not to mention the
unforgettable lines.
“Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. WORKING MEN OF ALL COUNTRIES, UNITE!”
With regards to the manifesto’s stance on the proletarians,
my mind once again draws parallel with another scathing work of George Orwell. In
his “1984”, the proletarians are called “proles” and they are treated like
outcasts by their totalitarian Government. The higher strata (members of the
Inner and the Outer party) of its society are constantly monitored but the
proles are left uncared for. They are the “social scum” who according to the
Government are only fit to eat and procreate, incapable of stirring up a
revolution. Winston Smith, the
protagonist thinks otherwise. “If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because
only there in those swarming disregarded masses, 85 per cent of the population
of Oceania, could use the force to destroy the Party ever be generated.” he writes. But that doesn’t happen. They stay
ignorant of their grim future and remain in a vegetative state.
“The “dangerous class,” the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of old society, may, here and there, be swept into the movement by a proletarian revolution; its conditions of life, however, prepare it far more for the part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue.”
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