Finding:

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   Karl Marx

   In 1867, well behind schedule, the first volume of Capital was published, a work which analyzed the capitalist process of production. ... Marx wrote extensively about this in terms of the problem of alienation.
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   Influences on Karl Marx

   It was Marx's inability to penetrate beneath the legal and polemical surface of the latter issue to its materialist, economic, and social roots that prompted him to critically study political economy. ... In 1861, Karl Marx wrote to his friend Ferdinand Lassalle, "Darwin’s work is most important and suits my purpose in that it provides a basis in natural science for the historical class struggle. ...
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   Marxism

   For example, shortly before he died in 1883, Marx wrote a letter to the French workers' leader Jules Guesde and to his own son-in-law Paul Lafargue, both of whom claimed to represent Marxist principles, in which he accused them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and of denying the value of reformist struggles. ... Black liberation theologian James Cone wrote in his book For My People that "for analyzing the structure of capitalism.
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   Historical materialism

   While the "historical" part of historical materialism does not cause a comprehension problem (i.e., it means the present is explained by analysing the past), the term materialism is more difficult. ... Towards the end of his life, in 1877, Marx wrote a letter to editor of the Russian paper Otetchestvennye Zapisky, which significantly contained the following disclaimer:
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   Value product

   Marx's manuscript for Das Kapital Vol. 3 ends with a discussion of "relations of distribution", but he did not live to complete his analysis. ... Subsequent Marxian scholars have argued the critique of political economy should continue, with regard to the new economic concepts and theories, rather than stop at the point where the ink dried on the last sheet of paper that Marx wrote on.
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   History of economic thought

   In the years immediately following Karl Marx's publication of Das Kapital, a revolution took place in economics. ... Coase and others like him wanted a change of approach, to put the burden of proof for positive effects on a government that was intervening in the market, by analysing the costs of action.
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   Class struggle

   As class boundaries broke down, the state apparatus would wither away. ... In a letter to Friedrich Engels in 1882 Karl Marx wrote: You know very well where we found our idea of class struggle; we found it in the work of the French historians who talked about the race struggle.
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   Dissent

   In a well known letter to Arnold Ruge, Karl Marx wrote: "if constructing the future and settling everything for all times are not our affair, it is all the more clear what we have to accomplish at present: I am referring to ruthless criticism of all that exists, ruthless both in the sense of not being afraid of the results it arrives at and in the sense of being just as little afraid of conflict with the powers that be."
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   Classical Marxism

   It is important to distinguish between "Marxism" and "what Marx believed"; for example, shortly before he died in 1883, Marx wrote a letter to the French workers' leader Jules Guesde, and to his own son-in-law Paul Lafargue, accusing them of "revolutionary phrase-mongering" and of denying the value of reformist struggles; "if that is Marxism" — paraphrasing what Marx wrote — "then I am not a Marxist." ... Political economy studies the means of production, specifically capital, and how this manifests itself in economic activity.
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    Evolutionary theory and the political left

    In 1861 Karl Marx wrote to his friend Ferdinand Lassalle, "Darwin’s work is most important and suits my purpose in that it provides a basis in natural science for the historical class struggle. ... ... In reality, the technique was neither new (it was known since 1854, and was extensively studied during the previous 20 years) nor useful.

Explore the following pages on Powerset:

• Karl Marx,
• Influences on Karl Marx,
• Marxism,
• Historical materialism,
• Value product,
• History of economic thought,
• Class struggle,
• Dissent,
• Classical Marxism,
• Evolutionary theory and the political left