His objection to Capitalism is that it forces the market division upon the worker - it creates and monopolizes opportunities such that the independent producer is unable to survive and thus men are forced into relationships where others (managers, owners) dictate the course of their day, the purpose of their labor, and grants the credit and benefit of that labor go to the company and not to the worker. The capitalist, "profits...by the division of labor and...by the advance which human labor makes on the natural product. The greater the human share in a commodity, the greater the profit of dead capital," (39).
The diversity of humanity is critical to its survival. The truth is that Marxism never took off, would never have been successful, and was never successful in any variation that it took. Marx gives this away when he says, " the human essence of nature first exists only for social man," (104). The reason for this is that human nature is not to be monotonously universal - that every person is not of the same mind and temperament, rather, they are a broadly and wildly diverse species that functions best within a market system that allows people to be both producers and consumers, to be creators and contributors within the economy. Without that kind of diversity, there would be none of what we have today in terms of modern technological, agricultural, scientific, or any other advance in the world.
Marx' ideal world naturally excludes formal education, while requiring indoctrination to the mental frameworks of Marxism in order for it to be made available to everyone and to become self-sustaining. So, what is at the core of Marxism is a commitment from all participants to be communally independent - which are, ironically, the requirements in great part, for the entrepreneurialism that marks successful capitalism. One cannot help but agree that there are varying degrees of quality in art. Individual artists are asserting their own perspective upon physical objects and thus creating a unique paradigm wholly unto themselves. However, in the act...
If we all liked the same things, if we all had the same aesthetic sense, this would be the case.
Thus, Marx' idea that as a species-being we are attached to a universal code of behavior, that we are all naturally inclined to be independent and to view the world in the same manner is actually a complete disconnect from the reality of human nature - that what is beautiful to one is ugly to another, and that such aesthetic sense is not dictated by economics.
While Capitalism might separate man from his labor - giving credit for the final product to people who never actually labored physically upon the product - our modern world has given us technologies, medicines, materials, and processes that have significantly improved the quality and duration of life and has increased our natural security. Marx' view of the species-being makes too big an assumption about the universality of the human personality. Thus, his doctrine absolutely ignores and thus negates the truth of human diversity and the diversity of human needs. Human nature is predicated on an interest in self-preservation, a willingness to give up particular rights in order to enjoy the protections of the community, and to further the cause of the community in order to secure personal security. Thus, humans seek to strike a balance by their very nature between independence of human spirit and dependence on the community for conformity and controlled or dictated participation in the local economy. The result, then, is that even in the most mutually supportive of economic models, the individual producer is as important as the person acting as the labor for production. Thus, Marx absolutely missed the necessity and nature of human diversity in his species-being doctrine.
Works Referenced
Marx, Karl & Engles, Freiderich. Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 Karl Marx. Martin Milligan, Translator. New York: Prometheus Books, 1988.
