The Revolutionary Ideas of Karl Marx


Book Description

An accessible introduction to the author of Capital and coauthor of The Communist Manifesto, with a focus on his relevance in today’s world. Few thinkers have been declared irrelevant and out-of-date with such frequency as Karl Marx. Hardly a decade has gone by since his death in which establishment critics have not announced the death of his theory. And yet, despite their best efforts to bury him, Marx’s specter continues to haunt his detractors more than a century after his passing. As the boom and bust cycle of global capitalism continues to widen inequality around the world, a new generation is discovering that the problems Marx addressed in his time are remarkably similar to those of our own. In this engaging and accessible introduction, Alex Callinicos demonstrates that Marx’s ideas hold an enduring relevance for today’s activists fighting against poverty, oppression, environmental destruction, and the numerous other injustices of the capitalist system.




The Ideas of Karl Marx


Book Description

This book offers a complete presentation of the most important themes of Marx’s thought, following the development of Marx’s theory from the beginning to his death and offering a reconstruction and analysis that covers the whole of Marx’s life and works. Each chapter presents one of the central topics of Marx’s reflection: the confrontation with the Hegelian theory of the State (1843); the critique of political liberalism in the “On the Jewish Question”; the discovery of Political Economy in the Manuscripts of 1844; the new theory of history developed in The German Ideology; the political theory and the revolution of 1848; the critique of political economy from the Grundrisse to Capital; and the political thought of the last Marx (the Paris Commune and the critique of the German Social Democratic Party).Stefano Petrucciani is Professor of Political Philosophy at the University of Rome La Sapienza, Italy.




Manifesto


Book Description

“If you are curious and open to the life around you, if you are troubled as to why, how and by whom political power is held and used, if you sense there must be good intellectual reasons for your unease, if your curiosity and openness drive you toward wishing to act with others, to ‘do something,’ you already have much in common with the writers of the three essays in this book.” — Adrienne Rich With a preface by Adrienne Rich, Manifesto presents the radical vision of four famous young rebels: Marx and Engels’ Communist Manifesto, Rosa Luxemburg’s Reform or Revolution and Che Guevara’s Socialism and Humanity.




The Ideas of Karl Marx


Book Description

Marx was the best hated and most calumniated man of his time. Governments, both absolutist and republican, deported him from their territories. Bourgeois, whether conservative or ultra-democratic, vied with one another in heaping slanders upon him. All this he brushed aside as though it were a cobweb, ignoring it, answering only when extreme necessity compelled him. And he died beloved, revered and mourned by millions of revolutionary fellow workers – from the mines of Siberia to California, in all parts of Europe and America… His name will endure through the ages, and so also will his work. Two hundred years after the birth of the great revolutionary Karl Marx, across the world, the capitalist system is in crisis and the working class are moving into action to change their lives. In ruling class circles, no longer do they snidely declare the death of Marx. On the contrary, there is fear and consternation in their ranks. There has, therefore, never been a more urgent time to study his ideas. This short book, released for the two hundredth birthday of Marx, contains a series of articles on the man, his life, and his ideas: from an explanation of the philosophy of Marxism; to Marx’s battles against petty-bourgeois anarchist ideas; to Trotsky’s assessment of the Communist Manifesto. And much more! This book should be read by all class-conscious workers as the beginning of the study of the ideas of Marxism. As Lenin said, “without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement."




Karl Marx’s Life, Ideas, and Influences


Book Description

Since the latest crisis of capitalism broke out in 2008, Marx has been back in fashion, and sometimes it seems that his ideas have never been as topical, or as commanding of respect and interest, as they are today. This edited collection arises from one of the largest international conferences dedicated to the bicentenary of Marx’s birth. The volume contains 16 chapters authored by globally renowned scholars and is divided into two parts: I) On the Critique of Politics; II) On the Critique of Political Economy. These contributions, from multiple academic disciplines, offer diverse perspectives on why Marx is still so relevant for our times and make this book a source of great appeal for both expert scholars of Marx as well as students and general readers who are approaching his theories for the first time.




Marxism


Book Description

This introductory text is a critical theory toolkit on how to how to make use of Karl Marx’s ideas in media, communication, and cultural studies. Karl Marx’s ideas remain of crucial relevance, and in this short, student-friendly book, leading expert Christian Fuchs introduces Marx to the reader by discussing 15 of his key concepts and showing how they matter for understanding the digital and communicative capitalism that shapes human life in twenty-first century society. Key concepts covered include: the dialectic, materialism, commodities, capital, capitalism, labour, surplus-value, the working class, alienation, means of communication, the general intellect, ideology, socialism, communism, and class struggles. Students taking courses in Media, Culture and Society; Communication Theory; Media Economics; Political Communication; and Cultural Studies will find Fuchs' concise introduction an essential guide to Marx.




Karl Marx's Theory of Ideas


Book Description

Marx's undeveloped ideas about how society presents a misleading appearance which distorts its members' understanding of it have been the subject of many conflicting interpretations. In this book John Torrance takes a fresh, un-Marxist approach to Marx's texts and shows that a more precise, coherent and cogent sociology of ideas can be extracted from them than is generally allowed. The implications of this for twentieth-century capitalism and for recent debates about Marx's conceptions of justice, morality and the history of social science are explored. The author argues that Marx's theory of ideas is sufficiently independent of other parts of his thought to provide a critique and explanation of those defects in his own understanding of capitalism which allowed Marxism itself to become, by his own definition, an ideology.




Debating Modern Revolution


Book Description

Revolution is an idea that has been one of the most important drivers of human activity since its emergence in its modern form in the 18th century. From the American and French revolutionaries who upset a monarchical order that had dominated for over a millennium up to the Arab Spring, this notion continues but has also developed its meanings. Equated with democracy and legal equality at first and surprisingly redefined into its modern meaning, revolution has become a means to create nations, change the social order, and throw out colonial occupiers, and has been labelled as both conservative and reactionary. In this concise introduction to the topic, Jack R. Censer charts the development of these competing ideas and definitions in four chronological sections. Each section includes a debate from protagonists who represent various forms of revolution and counterrevolution, allowing students a firmer grasp on the particular ideas and individuals of each era. This book offers a new approach to the topic of revolution for all students of world history.




Karl Marx


Book Description

Looks at the life of the father of Communism focusing primarily on the human side of the man rather than his works.




Fire and Hemlock


Book Description

A fantastic tale by the legendary Diana Wynne Jones—with an introduction by Garth Nix. Polly Whittacker has two sets of memories. In the first, things are boringly normal; in the second, her life is entangled with the mysterious, complicated cellist Thomas Lynn. One day, the second set of memories overpowers the first, and Polly knows something is very wrong. Someone has been trying to make her forget Tom - whose life, she realizes, is at supernatural risk. Fire and Hemlock is a fantasy filled with sorcery and intrigue, magic and mystery - and a most unusual and satisfying love story. Widely considered to be one of Diana Wynne Jones's best novels, the Firebird edition of Fire and Hemlock features an introduction by the acclaimed Garth Nix - and an essay about the writing of the book by Jones herself.