Karl Marx

Karl Marx was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet The Communist Manifesto (written with Friedrich Engels), and his three-volume Das Kapital (1867–1894), a critique of classical political economy which employs his theory of historical materialism in an analysis of capitalism. Born in Trier in the Kingdom of Prussia, Marx studied at the universities of Bonn and Berlin, and received a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Jena in 1841. While in Paris, he met Engels, who became his closest friend and collaborator. After moving to Brussels in 1845, they were active in the Communist League. Marx was expelled from Belgium and Germany, and in 1849 moved to London, where he wrote Das Kapital. Marx's critiques of history, society and political economy hold that human societies develop through class conflict. In the capitalist mode of production, this manifests in conflict between the ruling bourgeoisie and working proletariat. Marx predicted that capitalism would lead to its self-destruction and replacement by socialism and eventually classless communist society.