Karl Marx, more than any other political philosopher, changed the course of human history with his works, and love him or hate him it is impossible to look through history without seeing the mark he left on it (Reiss, 1: 1997). Through the cold war and his influence on Lenin and Stalin, across China and North Korea, close to home in Cuba, the effects of Marx is everywhere. Though many have said that the age of Marx is dead, and that his theories did not or perhaps never held water, this ignores a crucial fact when it comes to political philosophy (Reiss, 137: 1997). Political philosophy is not set in stone, and their theories are supposed to grow with new information, but even considering that Marx’s writing was still more prescient than the works of other giants in that field. This essay will argue that Marx is not dead, and that his work can still be used to illuminate the world politick better than most historical political theories. This essay will argue this in the following way. First it will look at the
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The first being that a state is naturally at war. And second that a moral sovereign must be empowered supremely to deal with this state of war, but at the same time this sovereign would be a moral person by their nature (Zagorin, 128: 2009). On the face of it this is nonsense upon stilts as even if we were to suppose the state of nature was eternally at war (though no proof is ever given) there is no reason to believe a single sovereign would ever act strictly benign. We need only look at the multitudes of horrific dictators to suggest otherwise, yet this is a core of his argument. This is also to not take into account the numerous contradictions and paradoxes that are present in Hobbes’ writing, as well as his places as a “pen for hire” (Springborg, 676-681: 2009). While not to suggest that all of Hobbes’ theories are without merit, but only to state they are profoundly flawed in numerous
The first being that a state is naturally at war. And second that a moral sovereign must be empowered supremely to deal with this state of war, but at the same time this sovereign would be a moral person by their nature (Zagorin, 128: 2009). On the face of it this is nonsense upon stilts as even if we were to suppose the state of nature was eternally at war (though no proof is ever given) there is no reason to believe a single sovereign would ever act strictly benign. We need only look at the multitudes of horrific dictators to suggest otherwise, yet this is a core of his argument. This is also to not take into account the numerous contradictions and paradoxes that are present in Hobbes’ writing, as well as his places as a “pen for hire” (Springborg, 676-681: 2009). While not to suggest that all of Hobbes’ theories are without merit, but only to state they are profoundly flawed in numerous