s, and in the tangible form those ideas take within civilization. A second trend running throughout Marxism is a materialist approach to history. To Marx, this meant that the central role of historical development was the productive aspects of civilization. Within this view, the basis for historical change is the conflict between the "haves" and the "have nots" otherwise known as class struggle. The next common element is a general view of capitalism. Marx viewed capitalism as an historical product, one which operated with scientific, and therefore discoverable, laws. Finally, as capitalism is an historical truth, so to is its eventual demise. Since capitalism will continue to exploit its workers in the desire for greater profit, there will come a time when the workers (proletariat) will rise up and throw off the chains of their oppressors. It is at this point that the doctrine of socialism will enter, which may be characterized as "from each according to his ability, to each according to his labor." Thus, Marx's writings hold a preconceived commitment to socialism. Contrary to popular myth, Marx did not spend much time at all talking about communism. For Marx, communism would be the stage in which society would evolve after socialism had run its course. The maxim would then become, "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need."2
Marx turned to the subject of economics after writing about the materialist conception of history in The German Ideology. The work was first presented in lectures to a German workers' society in 1847, and finally published in 1849. Marx's collaborator and patron, Friedrich Engels, did some minor editing and substituted the phrase "labour power" for the term "labour" to mean the sale of worker labor to the capitalist.3
Marx first begins by asking "What are wages, and how are they determined?" Wages are thus explained as the amount that the worker sells to the capitali...