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Saw the bourgeoise as

“Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps into two classes directly

facing each other: Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.” (Karl Marx The Communist Manifesto) If a person made

this observation today it would be less than interesting, but Marx made it in 1848...astonishing. Marx saw

the struggle between the bourgeois and the proletariat as a natural consequence of capitalism at a time

when capitalism itself was in it’s infancy. In his own words, “The contradictions inherent in the

movement of capitalist society”, will lead to a, “universal crisis.”(A contribution to the critique of

political Economy by Karl Marx pg. 26) Many critics of Marx's theories and assertions point to the fact

that this 'crisis' has not yet arisen. Those critics must realize that capitalism today does not function in the

same way as the 'pure' capitalism of Marx's era. Government regulation and stabilization of the financial

system has maintained the system of capitalism and revolutionary movements have inspired changes in

the way way that capitalist governments and societies operate. Regardless of what critics may have to say

Marxists ideals have inspired revolution after revolution. This is not because Marx's ideals are incendiary

(which some would say they are), but because, for the Proletarian, who have worked for the gain the gain

of others while gaining nothing themselves, Marx shines the light of wisdom upon a truth they already

existentially know and understand.

In order to expound on the nature of the class struggle, and it's ramifications, I must first explain the

relationship between labor and capitol. "Marx was the first thoroughly to investigate the value-creating

quality of labour and he discovered in so doing that not all labour apparently, or even really, necessary for

the production of a commodity adds to it under all circumstances a magnitude of value which corresponds

to the quantity of labour expended."(Engels Introduction to Wage and Labour) That is to say that there is

no consistent correlation between the amount of labor involved in producing a product and the value

added to that product by said labor. In The Critique of Capitalism: Wage and Labour, Marx makes the

observation that workers do not sell their ‘labour’ to the capitalists, per se, but rather their ‘labour power’.

The poignancy of this observation is made evident when Marx further states: "...the exercise of labour
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power... is the worker’s own life-activity, the manifestation of his own life. And this life-activity he sells

to another person in order to secure the necessary means of subsistence...He works in order to live."

Here lies the essence of the class struggle, "labour power is... a commodity which it's possessor, the

wage-worker, sells to capital"(Wage and Labour) but, if as previously stated, there is no consistent way of

quantifying the value of that labour power these questions, among others, arise: "What is the cost of

production of labour?", "How is the value of labor-power deciphered?", and "Who decides to validate or

invalidate that value?" Some "economists like Ricardo", believed, "that the value of a commodity is

determined by the labour necessary for its production...But as soon as the economists applied this

determination of value by labour to the commodity "labour," they fell into one contradiction after

another", for, "If labour is the measure of all values, then indeed we can express the "value of labour" only

in labour. But we know absolutely nothing about the value of an hour of labour, if we only know that it is

equal to an hour of labour."

Classical economists concluded that, "The value of a commodity is equal to its cost of production."

Yet, since the cost of labour-power cannot be quantified classical economists had to find another way of

measuring the cost of labor. "Instead of investigating the cost of production of labour itself, which

unfortunately cannot be ascertained, they proceed to investigate the cost of production of the worker."

Indeed, in modern times we use this very method of measuring a workers value. A workers labor is worth

more, or less, depending on the amount of schooling and/or expertise required to fulfill a given position,

in most instances (teachers don't get paid enough for the time investment and entertainers make too much,

but I digress). "Wages, as we have seen, are the price of a definite commodity, of labour power. Wages are,

therefore, determined by the same laws that determine the price of every other commodity. The question,

therefore, is, how is the price of a commodity determined?" Here I will not waste the readers by time by

quoting Marx for his conclusion can be stated in far simpler terms; The value of a commodity is

determined by the cost of it's production and furthermore by it's market value.
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In the production of commodities all values are fixed except the value of labour-power. The necessity

of the capitalist is to acquire capital, hence the name, capital-ist. If the acquisition of capital is hindered by

the costs of production the capitalist has one of two options: either improve the efficiency of the

production process or cut the cost of said process. Since, the prior part of the process is usually as refined

as possible due to the constant need to do it better, faster, cheaper, the latter, is often the action taken. But,

if as previously stated, all the costs inherent in production are fixed except for labor, it can been said that

the worker will bear the brunt of the loss in the event that the price of commodity is worth less than the

cost of production.You see the inherent contradictions of bourgeoisie and proletariat are embedded within

the relationship that each of them has to the other and to capital itself. The worker always desiring to gain

as much capital as possible for his labour-power and the capitalist desiring to constantly spend as little

capital as possible while increasing productivity and thus profits.

"Modern Industry (i.e. capitalism) develops, on the one hand, the conflicts which make absolutely

necessary a revolution in the mode of production, and the doing away with its capitalistic character –

conflicts not only between the classes begotten of it, but also between the very productive forces and the

forms of exchange created by it. And, on the other hand, it develops, in these very gigantic productive

forces, the means of ending these conflicts." (Frederick Engels/ Socialism: Utopian and Scientific)

When Engels characterized Marx's work as "scientific" rather than Utopian he was distinguishing it

from the works/actions of others such as Saint-Simon, Fourier, and Robert Owen. Engels seems to have

respected these men for their courage, he even credits Saint-Simone with introducing "the idea of the

future conversion of political rule over men into an administration of things and a direction of processes of

production". (Engels/ Socialism Utopian and Scientific) Still, Marx and Engels viewed these men as

idealistic at best and phantasmal at worst. This idealistic simplicity of thought, Engels believed, was not as

much an attribute of the minds, but ,as he wrote of Hegel later in the same text, "by the necessary limited

extent of (their) own knowledge and, second, by the limited extent and depth of the knowledge and
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conceptions of (their) age." In Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, Engels wrote, "the crude conditions of

capitalistic production and the crude class conditions correspond crude theories. The solution of the social

problems, which as yet lay hidden in undeveloped economic conditions, the Utopians attempted to evolve

out of the human brain." So, regardless of Engels respect for these men, their thoughts, and their actions,

he clearly disregards their Utopian efforts as misguided. "To (Utopians), Socialism is the expression of

absolute truth, reason and justice, and has only to be discovered to conquer all the world by virtue of its

own power. And as an absolute truth is independent of time, space, and of the historical development of

man, it is a mere accident when and where it is discovered."(ESUS) The main flaw Engels saw in such a

rational was that, "With all this, absolute truth, reason, and justice are different with the founder of each

different school. And as each one’s special kind of absolute truth, reason, and justice is again conditioned

by his subjective understanding, his conditions of existence, the measure of his knowledge and his

intellectual training, there is no other ending possible in this conflict of absolute truths than that they shall

be mutually exclusive of one another." (ESUS Utopianism) Thus, a scientific methodology needed to be

applied to Socialism in order for the movement towards a Socialist/Communist society to gain congruity.

Hegelian philosophy released history, or more exactly the historical conversation, from the shackles

of metaphysics. Allowing scholars such as Kant, Engels, and Marx to discuss history in dialectic terms.

Prior to Hegel European scholars built new philosophies upon the foundations of "irreconcilable

antitheses", things were isolated and their essences fixed (good vs. evil) Engels explained metaphysical

reasoning best when in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific he wrote:

"At first sight, this mode of thinking seems to us very luminous, because it is that of so-called sound

commonsense. Only sound commonsense, respectable fellow that he is, in the homely realm of his own

four walls, has very wonderful adventures directly he ventures out into the wide world of research. And

the metaphysical mode of thought, justifiable and necessary as it is in a number of domains whose extent

varies according to the nature of the particular object of investigation, sooner or later reaches a limit,
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beyond which it becomes one-sided, restricted, abstract, lost in insoluble contradictions. In the

contemplation of individual things, it forgets the connection between them; in the contemplation of their

existence, it forgets the beginning and end of that existence; of their repose, it forgets their motion. It

cannot see the woods for the trees."

The paradigmatic shift in the way in which history was analyzed, spearheaded by Hegel, allowed for

a new 'science' of Socialism to arise. "Socialism was no longer an accidental discovery of this or that

ingenious brain, but the necessary outcome of the struggle between two historically developed classes —

the proletariat and the bourgeoisie.", now the task was, "to examine the historico-economic succession of

events from which these classes and their antagonism had of necessity sprung." This new way of thinking

was vital in the foundation of "historical materialism". "The materialist conception of history starts from

the proposition that the production of the means to support human life and, next to production, the

exchange of things produced, is the basis of all social structure; that in every society that has appeared in

history, the manner in which wealth is distributed and society divided into classes or orders is dependent

upon what is produced, how it is produced, and how the products are exchanged." Thus the materialist

would seek truth and understanding not in the opaque machinations of man but "in changes in the modes

of production and exchange." The strength in this method of historical analysis can now be easily grasped

by a person who has even a limited knowledge of history. For in every era there are new products and new

forms of production and the lives of those who live during that era are changed in some way by those

inventions. Agriculture, guns, steel, ships, nuclear energy, cars, television, the cotton gin, the printing

press, the airplane, the assembly line, the International Monetary Fund... once again I digress. Marx and

Engels more than Lois and Clark traveled boldly into the unknown and discovered things that would

change the lives of billions. Some for better, some for worse.

As to the extent of the legitimacy of political or social 'science' it depends on one's definition of

'science', of which there are many. According to Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, the definition of
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science is "knowledge attained through study or practice," or "knowledge covering general truths of the

operation of general laws, esp. as obtained and tested through scientific method [and] concerned with the

physical world." Knowledge of social and political trends can definitely be "attained through study and

practice". As Engels laid out, a materialistic analysis is "dependent upon what is produced, how it is

produced, and how the products are exchanged", and their exists, "knowledge covering general truths of

the operation of general laws" of products and production. Yet science, in all it's accomplishment, has

never fully understood the human mind and thus cannot fully analyze, quantify, or calculate human

potential, for improvement or destruction. Therein lies the enigmatic nature of the ‘humanities’. As we

continually attempt to glean a better understanding of sociopolitical movements we cannot fully

understand ourselves. With each discovery we make about ourselves more questions arise. The core issue

remains: The study of sociopolitical science whether real or unreal is futile as long as the potential of the

human race remains unrealized.