Friedrich Engels was a German theorist, philosopher, politician and revolutionary. Alongside his friend Karl Marx (1818-1883), Engels collaborated with Marxist theory.
Biography
Friedrich Engels was born in the German city of Barmen on November 28, 1820.
He spent his childhood and adolescence in Germany and at the age of 22 moves to England, Manchester. There he began to work in a fabric factory, which belonged to his father.
This period of life was essential for Engels to develop his theory about the working class, observing the misery and conditions of the workers who lived within the capitalist regime. In 1845 he wrote “The Situation of the Working Class in England”.
For a time he was part of the left group of the “Young Hegelians”, who studied Hegel's philosophy.
In 1844 he meets Karl Marx in Paris, France. With him, Hegel begins to develop different theories and write works.
The most outstanding was the “Communist Manifesto” written in collaboration with Marx and published in 1848. In this work, they bring together the principles of communism.
After Marx's death in 1883, Engels finished and published the rest of the volumes of Marx's most emblematic work: “The capital”.
Engels died in London, England, on August 5, 1895, from throat cancer.
Works by Friedrich Engels
Engels owns a vast work focused on social analysis, the main ones being:
- The Situation of the Working Class in England (1845)
- Basic Principles of Communism (1847)
- The Peasant Wars in Germany (1850)
- Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Germany (1852)
- On the Housing Question (1873)
- Social in Russia (1875)
- For the History of the League of Communists (1885)
- Legal Socialism (1887)
- From Utopian Socialism to Scientific Socialism (1890)
Several works were written in partnership with Karl Marx, of which the following stand out:
Statue of Marx and Engels in Berlin, Germany
- The Holy Family (1844)
- The German Ideology (1846)
- The Communist Manifesto (1948)
- Class Fights in Germany (2010)
- Class Fights in Russia (2013)
Engels' Main Ideas
O scientific socialism it was one of the main socialist theories formulated by Engels and Marx in 1840.
Based on this bias, theorists sought to study in depth the capitalist system and the class struggle (bourgeoisie and proletariat). In short, this political, social and economic theory was based on the scientific and critical analysis of the capitalist system.
According to them: "The history of humanity is the history of class struggle.”
Furthermore, with Marx, he elaborated the theory of historical materialism and dialectical. This theory was intended to understand social phenomena through work and modes of production.
Want to know more? Read too:
- Socialism
- Capitalism
- Materialism
- Class struggle
- Marxism
- Dialectics: the art of dialogue and complexity
Engels' phrases
- “Political, legal, philosophical, religious, literary, artistic, etc. development rests on economic development. But they all react equally to each other, as well as to the economic base..”
- “The most explored are the mothers of our people. They are hand and foot tied by economic dependence. They are forced to sell themselves in the marriage market, like their prostitute sisters in the public market..”
- “According to the materialist conception of history, the determining factor in history is, ultimately, the production and reproduction of real life.”
- “The ultimate determining factor of history is the production and reproduction of immediate life.”
- “Those who work in the bourgeois regime do not profit and those who profit do not work.”
- “An ounce of action is worth more than a ton of theory.”
