Communism What the heck is it Marx Karl

Communism What the heck is it?

Marx • • • Karl Marx was an economist and philosopher in the 19 th Century • Marx saw that people were working in factories for low wages, being exploited by factory owners, but at the same time the country was getting richer. He was interested in how the UK was developing through the industrial revolution The industrial revolution was when society changed from being a peasant economy, based on people farming small plots of land.

Features of Communism • Community • Cooperation • Class war • Equality • Common Ownership

Community • Communists believe that we are all part of a common humanity. • Everything we know and everything we are, we owe to the society around us.

Cooperation • Communists believe that human beings are naturally pack animals and we work better as a group. • Communists believe that competition is bad for people and when we cooperate with each other we can achieve far more than we can as individuals pitted against each other.

Class Politics • Communists believe that in capitalist society the workers are being exploited by business owners, paying them as little as possible to make the most possible profit out of their work. • The only way we can progress is to have a revolution where we overthrow the business owners and take control of the factories and run them for the good of the people.

Equality • Communists believe all humans are born equal and deserve equal status, no matter their gender, ethnicity, ability or disability, sexuality or age. • Communists believe that work deserves equal reward – that there should be no need for money- that people will naturally do the jobs that give them satisfaction, for the good of the community, rather than just for a wage. • “From each according to his/her ability, to each according to his/her need”, this would mean that everyone in society would have their needs met automatically, there would be no stigma in asking for help.

Common Ownership • Communists believe that there should be no private property, all businesses, banks etc should be owned by the people together and should not be run for property. • Transport and housing should be provided to all who need it.

Communist experiments • As you can see the ideas of communism would be particularly persuasive for people living in poverty. This is why leaders around the world have claimed to be communist in order to control populations. • Several countries have had revolutions that have claimed to be communist, but the result is nearly always totalitarianism – so could communism ever work, or would it always be hijacked by the crazy men?

Activity • Analyse the differences between Communism and Capitalism