What is Marxism? | Marxism Explained | Who was Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels? Communist Manifesto 

You have made what must have taken a lot of work in learning and understanding, easy to understand for those who are not as knowledgeable. THANK YOU!

The first two criticisms of what Marx predicted are completely true though lmao. Capitalism as it has matured has become increasingly consolidated in monopolies and the largest firms have more power than ever. His prediction of boom and bust cycles and depressions was also completely accurate. We're about to go through another recession right now and despite being told they were rare occurrences or would diminish in frequency, this will mark the 5th global economic crisis in just the 21st century. If anything Marx's ideas are more relevant in today's world than they were when he wrote it, because then the working class was not the majority and capitalism was not global. Also of course societies without money, private property, and competition have existed. Capitalism is the only time in history where markets are the central mechanism of production. They existed before in some societies, but it wasn't the foundation of the economy. That makes capitalism historically contingent, and it'd be odd to say the features of a capitalist economy are permanent. Was Rome or Egypt permanent? Was the divine right of kings permanent? Why would today be any different?

'Although markets have changed over time, they haven't led to the prevalence of monopolies.' Yes they have. A handful of giant corporations produce and distribute most of the world's food. And a handful of tech titans effectively control everything now - including, most importantly and drastically, our minds.

Very simply and nicely explained. Great effort has been put into making the video and it shows. Thanks a lot! This really helped.

Thanks for including your sources, helps a lot.

The definitive document of Marxism wasn't the Communist Manifesto, it was Das Kapital. I think you can be a Marxist without being a Communist, that just means you agree with the description of the problem, but not necessarily the prescription being offered. You can also be a Socialist without being either a Communist or Marxist. Socialism preexisted Marx (it produced Marx), and is an anti Capitalist movement born in capitalist UK. Here I'm using a more specific, academic definition of Marxism, as a perspective in political economy. It's difficult to understand anti Capitalism without understanding the history of Socialism in the UK and USA - it was there before Marx, after Marx and without Marx. I'm not sure exactly why we still find this political economist from 19th century imperial UK so fascinating, must have been something he said...

I'm a Polisci student. I really like your videos. Subscribed!

"They have not led to monopolies." Good joke as now more than ever there is an enormous high concentration in every possible industry.

I can't thank you enough for the great videos. As a visual learner, so far, this has been the best video I've ever watched. I learned so much from your way of explaining it. Please cover more economic lessons in your next videos.

EXCELLENT video, it was very infomative, concise and easy to understand. You earned a new subscriber +1 👍🏽 I hope your channel blows up, you deserve way more views for the amount of effort/research you put into your videos. 😎

Nice Illustrated explanation!

I'm currently watching this video December 30th of 2023 and I think the what Marx predicted is extremely relevant in today's society.

Wow. Nicely done. Not any easy topic to handle without getting one side or the other a little riled. Bravo. Keep up the good work!

4th 2:30 5th 2:43 1921 1 Introduction. Stimulation of the vagal nerve decelerates the heart rate due to release of acetylcholine (ACh). This was demonstrated for the first time by Otto Loewi in 1921 and the “Vagusstoff” (ACh) became the first neurotransmitter ever discovered (Loewi, 1921).

wow! this was interesting and simple to understand😍

thank you so much I have an essay due soon and this was very easy to understand great video :)

Bravo. Very well explained

Good job!

I love these videos! They are simple to understand and they’re very straightforward, thanks!

4:56 Did you mean to say “Likely” or “Unlikely”? I can’t tell if you’re saying it’s a possible scenario or not.

There have only been two real world experiments where a single society was split into a more socialist half and a more capitalist half. Those are East/West Germany and North/South Korea. Both experiments resulted in economic and humanitarian disaster for the unfortunate souls who found themselves on the socialist side.

Very good description

Nicely done. Can you also cover Psychology topics? Especially, psychological assessment and testing. Thank you and more power.

Ur voice is too good nd impressive

Great video you should do the difference of classical liberalism and libertarianism

Thank you

Thanks for sticking to the facts. This is something I can use in my class.

what software does this illustrations

thank you :)

I guess the only thing that is becoming more of an issue with the criticism is the fact that some of it just not true anymore. Monopolies are in fact becoming more and more of an issue, and without the state intervening it would been a massive problem. And the state intervening is in fact a socialist approach not a capitalist approach. So saying that Marxism is wrong because it did not appear is both wrong, as well as the examples not being relevant to the capitalism it was referring to for its time.

The problem is federal and state interest on new money entering the system. And each man or woman can only issue new money equally upon evidence of previous issuance is canceled.

The goal of the current regime. So obvious. 😮

Great video, thank you very much , note to self(nts) watched all of it 5:05

Well Done. Show and Tell. Beautifully illustrated and distilled summary. Intellectually-honest.

I believe UBI si the effective compromise in the two economic systems. Industries have to compete for labor and consumer while the people is given the choice to work 80 hour weeks.

You're the best 😘

i've only heard of the man. nothing else, until this.

The problem isn't capitalism. The solution most certainly isn't communism.

Except that a. The proletariat can become the bouguizi in capitalism and b. What happens when the workers control the means of production? Mao, Stalin and Hitler.

let's work this in reverse, which political system has led to the most deaths and malfunctioning economies? there is no need to ponder over this question, the result are out!

Monopolies can only be created and held in place by the strong central governments that Marie favored.

No monopolies, you say? Might want to take a closer look at that.

It hasn’t let to monopolies because of laws put into place to prevent it. If it weren’t for the laws I’m pretty sure we would have one store for everything.

Like it

Did he explained what Marxism is?

They made predictions, and the outcome was the opposite of what they predicted. 1956 was the final nail in the coffin.

Marxism is open to different forms of interpretation

The last part is the biggest fact.

Hows this helping me tomorrow is my exam

In the fascism video you talked about the killings and authoritarianism, but in this video you make no mention of genocides or the authoritarianism that came with marxist ideology.

The vanguard is Lenin not marx.

Hasn’t lead to monopolies…right

There are many errors in this video. Socialism and communism are the same thing, Marx and Engels used the two terms interchangeably. There is no inevitability in the argument presented by Marx and Engels. They recognised that the only end for capitalism will happen only with a conscious and democratic majority ending it to replace capitalism with socialism, not by a vanguard leading the majority (that's Leninism). The makers of the video needs to re-asses their understanding of the word "alienation". It does not refer to workers becoming resentful and unhappy, although this could and does happen. The speaker then continues to make substantial errors in critical understanding. Competition does indeed lead to monopolies. Despite the best efforts of capitalist governments they do arise on a regular basis. And again Marx does not claim that such monopolies could or would lead to a collapse of capitalism. The speaker then informs us that crisis are not an inherent feature of capitalism when quite clearly crisis, collapse and depression are. Again Marx points out that this will not bring about the end of capitalism but merely a re-alignment of the same system that destroys the lives of workers all over the world. Best to go to the original and decide for yourselves.

A few counter points. "Lowest possible wages" is misleading. Competition between industries and market demand determine wages. Those companies who offer the best wages will attract the best skills, which lead to productivity gains over their competition. It's a cost-benefit calculation. And another factor overlooked, turnover is expensive. Onboarding and training are expensive and time consuming, and it's a wise employer who seeks to retain employees by financial incentives. Bottom line, Marx didn't understand the free market, he was wrong about competition, and never got to see the prosperity that capitalism would create.

Frantz Fanon

Marx didnt say that there weerw only two classes, but there where two antagonist classes, he admitted that there were (and there are) other classes.

Is no-one else here gonna make a joke about Marx from Kirby Super Star/Super Star Ultra?

I am not Marxist.However I contemplate that most of these ideas just illustrate reality in modern society.

Yes, it is an unworkable concept. There's no incentive to work and innovate.

Never before have so many people had so much money, yet we have people living in tent cities, which doesn't shock anyone over the last 8-10 years. These tent cities are getting bigger not smaller...... this cannot be a good sign in our capitalist world.

I think there are more substantial criticisms of Marxism than the three presented. Class conflict theory is disputed. Dialectic and historical materialism have been strongly critiqued. Very few non-Marxists support the labor theory of value. The inevitability of any system is highly suspect as well. History is not teleological, but evolutionary, constantly adapting to present conditions. The complexity inherent to evolutionary processes makes it nonlinear and nondeterministic.

@Dan Zimmerman - produce & illustrate a vedio to describe the current Events on the political stage, utilizing the ideology, & tactics of the left & right. Utilize most recent past events from foreign policies to National current events highlight culture, political, race, sex/Gender, and ethnicity We believe that what you will find will be shocking. It will be educational for the Public at large.

"climate change" tells us everything we need to know about marxism

You left out some of the more salient aspects of Marxism, like the violence needed to separate the people from their property, the inevitable starvation of millions of people because communal farming is always an abject failure, the need to force people to work at the point of a gun because people are not inherently altruistic and willing to work for the benefit of others, etc.

Seems extremely complex yet extremely simple at the same time 😂

Many people in this thread don't understand what monopoly means. To be in monopoly a company must control more than 80% of the market. That's nearly impossible in a global economy. The only monopolies are the ones that are closely intertwined with government. Marx predicted the end of Capitalism within his lifetime. After Marx died economic growth went through the roof. The best 150 years have been incredible with massive new technologies and huge improvements in child mortality rates. We live in the best time of all human history and people want to whine about it on the internet on their $1,000 iPhone.

"We" have to keep trending until the government gives us a chatbot for our problems. It seems as obvious as the classic suggestion box.

I laughed out loud at the criticisms bc they’re something that do happen continuously within capitalism

I looked up Kirby Marx….

A society without money, competition, and private property actually HAS materialized

The pitchforks are coming TED TALK

mho

I didn’t know what Marxism was until I watched this video

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Excellent video. In my opinion Communism/socialism doesn't work. You should do a video about fascism.

Can Christianity be in Communism / Marxism

I think a breakdown of Marxism should, by default, include the "features" said ideology comes with. Socialism requires the creation of an all-powerful bureaucrat state. One that can at will remove everything from its people, backed by the threat of violence. It also requires this new party to somehow be kind and incorruptible so as not to abuse its absolute power(lol). All Marxist movements have led to enormous misery, loss of rights, loss of culture, and caused the greatest genocides we have knowledge of in history. Far more useful facts to include than the 3 "critiques" you detailed in the video. When you live in the abstract world of a classroom, theories and critiques are all you have, but when history has already provided you with real-life experiments, that's what you should focus on.

Marx stars with plato , Aristotle, kant, hegel . Then you can do marx...

I think Marx made some good points, however he instead of a revolution (un-)intentionally made a neo-religion of severely dangerous people like Stalin, Mao and Castro, who ended up killing more than two world wars combined.

I pray the proletariat of America wakes up, sees their naivety and stand up for theirs.

As a Marxist, this video is incredibly accurate, thank you!

THE DEMOCRITIZATION OF ECONOMICS

Dont end up in monopolies? Ever heard of Blackrock?

“An unworkable concept”. Explain that to the college kids who are screaming about capitalism.

As being born in USSR and educated there, author missed one important concept: prehistoric society had no classes. Al persons were equal. Then slavery developed, became inefficient and changed to feudalism, which became inefficient and turned into capitalism. Capitalism also will become inefficient and need to be changed to communism.

Capitalism has led to the most wealth creation in the history of the world. As any student of History will tell you, there has never been more prosperity in the history of humanity than there is right now, and this is due to capitalism. Conversely, socialism and communism have led to more oppression, death, and starvation than any other economic system.

Capitalism is not monarchism, it’s principle good is labor is a capital hood and all those who give their labor have a right to property of equal value. The other economic structures insist that only those with access to power or precious metals can own property. The communist failure is that nobody has a right to property and so nobody has insentive to work. As John Locke said government exists to protect property and each of us has a property in our body and minds that is inherently ours.

Marxism is too simplistic, it takes no account of human nature, and the need for checks and balances. It ignores the fact that business owners often take great risks and work incredibly hard to establish their businesses. Some workers are highly skilled, and in demand. Companies that treat staff well may see lower turnover. The command economy has been shown to fail, free enterprise is needed to respond to demand and drive innovation and efficiency. Competition allows better products that benefit society. We’ve seen that all communist states become hell holes, led by a psychopath, with a privileged elite, and an oppressed mass. That is because they lack checks and balances, they lack independent scrutiny of the legislature, and a way to defenestrate a poor leader. Instead corruption runs rife.

Capitalism and socialism are codependents. During Marx's time there were few if any social safety nets.

Guess they for 401k

I prefer Georgism, tax land not people.

All this everyone is equal crap is a joke. No competition means no quality, no effort and that means no proggression. To anyone that needs this. I spent 14 years slaving away in a warehouse literally brain washed thinking I had a good gig made decent money with decent benefits.😂 I got brave took a risk and left. I am now in sales my income has doubled almost over night. My credit is good for the 1st time in my life and I am genuenly happy. I heard a man one time say there are 4 paths to success. 1. Medicine 2. Law 3. Sales 4. Business owner Guys break out of the matrix and start living. Stop expecting other people to take care of you. That's exactly what I was doing for 14 years working for that warehouse. I show up slave away and my master gave me my bare necessities. The day I left was the day I started taking care of myself and iv flurrished. If I can do it anyone can!

Marx used the word 'depreciation' 35 times in the first two volumes of his major work. He never made any mention of Planned Obsolescence. He never saw automobiles or refrigerators. The concept of GNP/GDP was developed in the late 1930s. Economists do not mention NNP/NDP very much. Almost never in fact. They only subtract the depreciation of Capital Goods like industrial robots and 18-wheel. The depreciation of durable consumer goods which may be subject to Planned Obsolescence is not worthy of their notice. Socialists do not seem to be able to figure out that we are running the planet on defective algebra. Where is the data on the annual depreciation of automobiles since Sputnik?

I thank God for Javier Milei who encapsulated everything that you put forth in this video. Milei was a university professor of economics in Argentina before running for the top office as its president. I have to confess that I know nothing about politics or economics...until not long after Justin Trudeau became our PM of Canada back in 2015. Talk about a socialist government! Now I've begun to pay attention to politics bigtime! Thank you so much for this post, and as Javier Milei summed up in his speech at the World Economic Forum near the end of January, 2024, "Long live freedom, damn it!".

It belongs into a museum!! Outdated and wrong anyway

Native Americans and multiple tribes around the world lived in communes where they shared everything. Also, nowhere in Marxism says that there can't be competition.

my fbi agent’s gonna hunt me down for watching this video 💀

It only killed 100million people last century...😅😮

The challenge here is the central standard for Marxism is Karl Marx. Power and control are part of the centralized communal attempt at progress. With capitalism, the central standard is a free market mystically governed by supply and demand and the drive for wealth, power and control. Neither takes into consideration the Living God who created all things and all people to Whom all people will give an account. He alone sets the standard for the most vibrant society. However, this takes a living relationship with Him. How does that happen? Plead with Him to transform your heart of stone into a heart of flesh. The truth will set you free. Call on the name of Jesus Christ for eternal salvation that will be reflected in history. National repentance is needed. Without it, no nation can stand as it will be divided against itself.

If you reduce Marx's thought to the communist manifesto, you will get it all wrong. It would be like studying a plan for a kitchen and claiming it's what cooking is about. The main issue is not class struggle, that is the material cause. The main issue that makes Marxism justified is a redefinition of humans as "working men", or the proletariat. So "work" is part of human nature, and giving away your work is like going against that very nature, it alienates people from their own desires and nature, and the work becomes meaningless. So if they revolt, it's not out of jealousy as you claim, it's out of nihilism. That's the real first principle of Marxism. The other reason is that it is democratic, it want everybody to be their own man fully, with the same rights as others. So the issue about justice is that the capitalist has a right to other people's work, based on the idea of private property, so every work that is done using his machinery or land is his. He did not earn anything from his own work, and he himself is alienated as well. If people don't understand those things, they will get it wrong. His solution was to abolish private property and it would magically fix things. The criticism you show are very superficial and don't go to the heart of it. They all seem wrong anyway, so they would prove Marx right. A better critique would be to deny that work is what constitutes a man, that it is quite external to him. Things can be improved that diminish that alienation and lots of people did that.. Factory work is not what it used to be, not even close. No need to uproot everything. The second critique that could be made is that he underestimate market forces and the need for specialization. Market forces did not create the monopolies he thought would happen, there are individual entrepreneurs that find new things to do all the time. He thought the petit bourgeois was dead or would die. He was completely wrong. If anything it is growing, but it's not for everybody, and that is the third criticism, he thinks people are equal in decision making and abilities. Unfortunately, not everybody is a salesman, not everybody is able to raise capital to invest, or organize things that work. Those are special skills that the capitalist do as well as provide leadership. Or course that means he can't actually do the production when he does that. So the whole idea of everybody being a proletariat is nonsensical and not desirable. Specialization is the heart of liberalism and democracy, and it is the only way to actual economical success. You can't get rid of it and think it will be the same, it's just not possible. That's also why it was never implemented, it does not work if you want something like a civilization. So that's what I am thinking about Marxism. It has some validity, but is the wrong solution to a wrong problem. And it's false historically, the necessity is just not true.