Summary: The Communist Manifesto (page 4)

If the proletarians revolt, their struggle remains poorly coordinated and often directed against the means of production, as we have seen—workers smashing machines, setting fire to factories, and so on. However, Marx noted that this was about to change.

Indeed, proletarians are becoming increasingly numerous, representing a growing force. They are becoming more conscious of their collective strength, and advances in machinery are making their employment increasingly precarious. They are beginning to organise themselves through associations and trade unions and are even building their own communication links, such as railways and roads. Marx highlights a few early victories, such as the introduction of the Ten Hours’ Bill in England.

The bourgeoisie, meanwhile, is perpetually at war—with the old aristocracy and with the bourgeoisies of foreign nations. Marx is undoubtedly alluding to the European wars of his time. Yet, in these struggles, the bourgeoisie is forced to call upon the proletariat, arming them in the process. In doing so, it unwittingly places weapons in the hands of the proletariat ¹.

The proletariat is the only truly revolutionary class within the capitalist system. Shopkeepers, artisans, and similar groups do not pose a genuine challenge to the bourgeoisie, as their opposition, if it exists, seldom translates into action. Tocqueville had already observed in Democracy in America that the spirit of commerce is inherently opposed to the spirit of revolution, since every investor and business owner is by nature risk-averse.

The sub-proletariat (Lumpenproletariat)—beggars, criminals, and others whom Marx describes as the rotting residue of the lowest layers of the old society—may participate in revolutions. However, their precarious existence makes them readily open to bribery and prone to reactionary behaviour ², such as acting as strike-breakers in the pay of the government.

Revolution is at hand when the proletariat has severed all ties with bourgeois values. For them, laws, morals, and religion appear as nothing more than bourgeois prejudices, concealing bourgeois interests ³.

For Marx, the transition from bourgeois society to a new social order cannot be achieved through reforms, but only through revolution:

The proletariat cannot rise to its feet, cannot stand upright, without overthrowing the entire edifice of official society ⁴.

This marks a key distinction between socialists (in the contemporary sense) and communists: the former advocate for reforms and incremental change, while the latter call for revolution—accepting that this includes the use of violence.

It is important to note a fundamental point: Marx does not condemn bourgeois society on moral grounds — he does not denounce it as unjust. He does not argue that society should transition to a new form because it would be morally superior.

His critique is grounded in logic, history, and fact, not in law or morality. Bourgeois society, he asserts, is doomed to disappear because it is riddled with contradictions that make its survival impossible.

We have already examined some of these contradictions, such as the relentless drive to resolve the crises of overproduction.

Marx encapsulates the central contradiction within capitalist society—a contradiction that must ultimately transform it—as follows: while feudalism at least guaranteed the subsistence of serfs, the bourgeois order does the opposite, driving the proletariat into ever deeper poverty. The bourgeoisie is incapable of governing because it cannot ensure the survival of its slaves within the framework of their enslavement. Above all, the bourgeoisie produces its own gravediggers. The fall of the bourgeoisie and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable ⁵.

From this perspective, the Communist Party has no other objective than to aid the proletariat in organising itself to hasten this inevitable collapse. This is the point at which Marx and Engels formally introduce the Communist Party — the section that gives their work its title, The Communist Manifesto.

¹ p.38
² p.39
³ p.40
⁴ ibid.
⁵ p.41