Marxism

Marxism is a socioeconomic theory regarding the idea that society is about the class struggles between the working class (proletariat) and the upper class (bourgeois). The class struggle arises when the bourgeois take advantage of the proletariat's labor for their own materialistic gain.

Base-superstructure Dialectic

Background

Marxism is a term created by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in the 19th century. It is considered a materialistic ideology more than an idealist one since it conveys the idea that material values determine social existence rather than ideas. That being said since material values change over team, Marxism should be looked at in historical context. According to Marx's base/superstructure model that entails what society is made of, the economy (referring to labor, production, and distribution) lays the foundation for the cultural values of the social institutions: family, government, law, etc. According to Marx, a society based on a capitalist mode of production is exploitative, due to the creation of two classes; the working proletariat and the ruling bourgeois. Because the bourgeois owns and regulates all the modes of production the only commodity that the proletariat is left to sell is its labor. Thus, the ruling upper class exploits the labor of the working class to increase profit.

Uses in other disciplines

Marxism can be found in the subjects of economics and world history as it is one of many ways to run the economics of many countries.

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