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Name:
Friedrich Engels
Dates:
Born: November 28 1820 in Barmen, Prussia
Died: August 5, 1895 in London, England
Biography:
Friedrich Engels (1820-1895) was a lifelong companion and collaborator of Karl
Marx, working with him to develop his theories on dialectical materialism,
historical materialism and communism. Whereas Marx wrote mostly on political
issues, Engels had a broader perspective and also wrote on politics and
aesthetics.
Engels was born into a wealthy industrial family and for a while he even worked in his father's business, but it wasn't long before he began to develop more radical ideas regarding the nature of economic and political relationships, probably due to the influence of the "Young Hegelians" philosophical movement. Under the pseudonym Friedrich Oswald he wrote radical articles for a number of different puoblications.
After a time Engels became involved with a movement to extend sufferage for English textile workers, known as Chartism. During this period he came to think that both history and politics could be best understood through the lens of how society developed economically. He also concluded that social evils in general were caused by the institution of private property and the use of private property to exploit commoners.
In 1844 he went to visit Karl Marx, a man who had been publishing works which expressed sympathies towards communism. It was at this time that Engels realized that they had both, independently, arrived at nearly identical views regarding economics, society and the rights of workers. They worked together to write Das Manifest der kommunistischen Partei in 1848 (The Communist Manifesto) and, one of the reasons both were forced to flee Prussia.
Prussian authorities tried to put pressure on the British government to expel Marx and Engels for their radical ideas, but Prime Minister, John Russell was took a liberal position with regards to free speech and simply refused. While there Engels took a position with Ermen and Engels, his father's textile firm, and used position to provide financial support to Marx - unfortunately, that support wasn't enough to keep the Marx family out of extreme poverty. The two continued to work together closely until Marx died in 1883.
Also Known As: none
Alternate Spellings: none
Common Misspellings: none
Related Resources:
What are Political and Legal Philosophy
The Philosophy of Politics and the Philosophy of Law are often studied separately, but they are presented here jointly because they both come back to the same thing: the study of force. Politics is the study of political force in the general community, while jurisprudence is the study of how laws can and should be used to achieve political and social goals.What is Philosophy?
What is philosophy? Is there any point in studying philosophy, or is it a useless subject? What are the different branches of philosophy - what's the difference between aestheitcs and ethics? What's the difference between metaphysics and epistemology?
