Marx has often been accused of overlooking human nature and morality in his theories. Many people seem to have this belief that Marx has no ethics, that he rejected morality, and envisioned communism as being beyond both ethics and morality. Within the 'Communist Manifesto' and 'Das Capital', there are undercurrents of his morality and how it relates to his written work. Despite this, the issue of Marx and his relation to morality poses a challenge. Throughout Marx's works, there is a strong distaste towards the capitalist society but there seems to be little saying where his distaste originates from. He never states that capitalism is unjust; neither does he say that communism would be just. He makes a very clear effort to remove and distance himself from the concept of justice and morality. Still, morality lingers within his work.
There is a certain level of confusion within Marx's works. In chapter 10 of 'Das Capital', Marx states, "As capitalist, he is only capital personified. His soul is the soul of capital. But capital has one single life impulse, the tendency to create value and surplus-value, to make its constant factor the means of production, absorb the greatest possible amount of surplus-labour. Capital is dead labor, that, vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labor, and lives the more, the more labor it sucks." (Capital, Volume 1, Chapter 10) This seems to give an idea of how Marx views capitalist negativity: linking vampirism to capitalism doesn't seem like a positive link. He goes on to condemn the egoism, exploitation, and degradation which capitalism brings into existence. Marx tries to stay neutral, trying to keep an empiricist scientific view of the world where morals can be hidden and avoided, but sometimes his guard is lowered and his real view and personal beliefs slip out showing his distaste of the capitalist system. He can't be without morals when he seems to have this theory that communism will create a "higher" plan of existence for humanity and will equalize the social standards.
[...] morality, religion, are to him [Proletariat] so many bourgeois prejudices, behind which lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests.” (Marx, Communism Manifesto, 216) Marx sees morality as a problem in the sense that it is used in the “social contract” presented in Contractarianism as a means to influence, and in the end control, the proletarian class. When morality becomes used in this way it leans away from being an eternal truth and turns into a weapon. Marx wishes to use the Bourgeois' weapons against that group or wishes to dismantle these weapons such as dismantling private property since that has been used as well to keep the working class at a lower level. [...]
[...] He can't be without morals when he seems to have this theory that communism will create a plan of existence for humanity and will equalize the social standards. There is also ethical philosophies which are threaded into Marx's writings. Contractarianism comes up often in the way Marx talks about capitalism. Contractarianism is based on the idea that people make a social contract with their fellow people on the bases of self-interest. This social contact is based on helping one another so that all people can best fulfill their self-interest. [...]
[...] This is exactly what Marx is trying to fight off with his writings and creation of communism. Marx notices that the working class is being used by the bourgeois class; they have created a system of government and a social contract of making a way for all to make money. Marx sees this, but also notices how this contract is being used to exploit the working class and use them to create things for the higher classes which are not shared. [...]
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