Philosophies of Marx and Engel
From the early to the late Marx, he remained a philosopher of human freedom. Marx envisioned freedom for all, not merely for the bourgeois, but for peasant as well. Marx strove to make individuals aware of their position in society, and to make the idea of emancipation sound like a possible means to a harmonious society. For Marx, to truly be free, one must understand the realization of freedom and morality. But he does not see these as fulfilled in the modern state. Social contradictions and class antagonism produced by capitalistic production methods must be overcome to be free. In order to accomplish freedom and morality, the socially repressed and deprived must revolt against capitalistic production conditions. The goal of this revolutionary revolt is human freedom beyond the limits of mere peasant; Marx desires a solid and humane society of free individuals. Marx is fully aware of the fact that the economy is not determined, and that in principle, it can be over come by revolution and the solid action of individuals. While Marxism promoted freedom for all individuals, with everyone working together for the good of the country, Stalin sought to elevate himself to supreme r . . .
Stalinism, as stated earlier, in no way resembled the Communist utopia that Marx and Engels had envisioned. Stalinism was not for the people, nor by the people, but instead a time of hardship and brutality that would have made Marx sick with disappointment. Marx and Engels failed to think their perfect world completely through. he (Marx) describes the future free society as 'the association of individuals which puts the conditions of the free development and movement of individuals under their control. Three decades after Stalin's death, the USSR was still ruled by command, not consent. The idea of Communism was challenged by many people within the country itself. Brilliant scholars, yet the immense planning their society would require, and the expertise in planning they did not have proved to be a problem. Virtually every part of life remained substantially under the control of the ruling party. von Hayek sums up the problem Marx and Engels faced: "If we can agree that the economic problem of society is mainly one of rapid adaptation to changes in the particular circumstances of time and place, it would seem to follow that the ultimate decisions must be left to the people who are familiar with these circumstances, who know directly of the relevant changes and of the resources immediately available to meet them. It was a society administered in an authoritarian fashion by a bureaucracy. They constructed an idea for a society the world had never seen.
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