Communist Manifesto

Economics

Karl Marx and Frederick Engels are known for their support of socialism and their disapproval of capitalist mode of production. In the communist manifesto, they make it clear that while they understand that machinery increases production, they couldn't possible consider factory system a good thing since it destroys human relations, creates an inhumane society and almost kills everything as it was previously known. Marx attacked capitalism on many occasions and in the Communist Manifesto explained in clear terms why his attack was justified. He felt that capitalist led to cruel pursuit of monetary ambitions which resulted in reduced human value, unfair wage structure, inhuman work conditions, unethical work practices and acute class struggle. Thus he completely disapproved of industrialization and work practices established under a capitalist economic system. Marx did not essentially have anything against industrialization but he felt that industrialization combined with capitalism was the root cause of many social and economic ills. He was not a supporter of free trade either for it essentially weakened state's control of resources that Marx had advocated so vehemently. "The bourgeoisie has through its exploitation of the world market given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country. To the great chagrin of reactionaries, it has drawn from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood." [the Communist Manifesto]

While Marx and Engels did not support capitalism and everything that it wrought upon the society, there were still some people in those times who offered unconditional support to the use of machinery, the factory system and the entire capitalist mode of production. One such person was Andrew Ure whose book the Philosophy of Manufactures, published in 1835 was written in outright defense of the factory system at a time when this system was being widely criticized. Ure presented the factory system as a system of improvement and progress where workers could get some relief from tedious manual tasks since machines did major work. He also attacked the critics of factory system and those who argued in favor of agricultural interests saying that factory system was all about taking care of the workers. He argued that if workers were ill in these factories, it was because they were very well fed. Karl Marx called Ure the most brutal representative of machine age and factory system. In fact most of Ure's arguments make little sense since they are written in such blind defense that they are usually way off the mark. He felt that since workers got to eat bacon and much rich food, they often fell sick. In defense of child labor accusation, he said that there was no valid evidence of child labor except the physical abuse experienced by them by drunken, adult workmen. He contrasted the work done in factories with such tasks as lace making, stocking knitting and rural work and felt that factory work was easier by comparison and less tedious or monotonous in nature. The arguments of Marx and Ure are as dissimilar as two could possibly be. While Marx believed that history of technology since 1830 could be described as one of 'weapons against the revolts of the working-class', Andrew Ure felt that machine system was just so perfect that it could destroy any labor unions that ever came into existence. Writing about the dressing machine, he said:

It affords an instructive warning to workmen to beware of strikes, by proving how surely science, at the call of capital, will defeat every unjustifiable union, which labourers may form.

Thomas Carlyle was another important figure of the time. He can be described as the man whose views ran somewhere in the middle of two extremes presented by Marx and Ure. While he understood that machine age was here to stay, he did not want people to rely too heavily on machines and was among the first few to criticize such dependence:

Not the external and physical alone is now managed by machinery, but the internal and spiritual also. Here too nothing follows its spontaneous course, nothing is left to be accomplished by the old natural methods... Men are grown mechanical in head and in heart, as well as in hand."