German thinkers Karl Marx and his associate Friedrich Engels worked on developing their Marxist doctrine over the course of about a decade, from the late 1840s to the early 1850s. In their work, the authors formulated the concept of culture, sharing, among other things, views on the history of art, and examined the formation of … Read more
There remains to be discussed one more stratum in capitalist society: the lumpen proletariat. The lumpen proletariat is that sector of the population that, having been denied a legitimate way to make a living, resorts to the illegitimate: i.e. thieves, fences, drug pushers, numbers men, gamblers, pimps, prostitutes, loan sharks, beggars, thugs, etc. The general … Read more
The proletariat is, in Engels’ words, “the class of modern wage labourers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labour power in order to live”. The concentration of the means of production in the hands of the bourgeoisie and the expropriation of the small producers is mirrored by … Read more
The petty bourgeoisie is an intermediate class between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, composed of a myriad of different sectors which vary from poverty-stricken to wealthy. It is divided into two main sections: 1) the small proprietors who still own the means of their own livelihood and “work for themselves”; and 2) the petty bourgeois … Read more