Karl Marx The Rights Of Man Analysis

Karl Marx sought to abolish the belief system that preserved the uneven distribution of wealth and prolonged the suffering of the proletariat. As a result of the industrial revolution, the upper class exercised its power over the lower classes exclusively for the purpose of protecting self-interest. The labor of the lower classes not only supported their subsistence, but upheld the luxurious existence of the bourgeoisie as well. While the bourgeoisie retained control of the means of production, they entered an agreement with the proletariat to form “the rights of man,” which preserve the rights to life, liberty, and security with the limitation that one man’s rights should not undermine the rights of another. In his effort to outline the implications of “the rights of man,” Karl Marx presents a clear argument that the rights to life, liberty, and security ultimately preserve self-interest and detach man from civil society. Initially, Marx defines liberty and challenges the ideology behind the term by underscoring the conditions that precede its existence. Marx draws from the French Constitution of 1793 to conclude that liberty is “the right to do and perform anything that does not harm …show more content…
Given that all property was primarily available to all members of a community, an individual cannot acquire property “without the consent of all his fellow-commoners” (Second Treatise of Government, p. 21). According to Locke, each individual has equal right to property, thus when an individual obtains goods, he or she does so with the permission of society given that each individual was presented opportunity to obtain the same goods, yet did not take it. By taking this perspective into account, one can withdraw that while private ownership creates inequality, it is permitted by society upon its