Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud on Human Nature
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Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud have different conceptions of human nature and different conceptions of how history develops from human actions and human nature. Marx considers human beings primarily as members of economic groups, while Freud considers human beings in terms of individual psychology and broader behaviors and psychological manifestations across populations. History for Marx is also an issue of economics, while for Freud history is shaped by the way the individual relates to his or her society. Marx centers on the economic and political and Freud on the inner life of the mind and the ways in which that manifests itself in human behavior. The two men have as their starting point a conception of human nature which shows why human beings behave as they do, and for both men the reasons for human behavior are hidden from view, hidden from the understanding of the majority of people responding to them. For Marx, the hidden force is economic and involves the relationship of the human being to labor, while for Freud the hidden force is found in theoretical constructs of the mind which govern different aspects of thought and behavior and whose interaction produces the behavior we can see. Marx had a conception of human history based on dialectical materialism, which includes the sense that the determining factors in the development, relations, and institutions of mankind are not mystical or ideological but economic. Human actions are rooted in men's labor activities.
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ial system, with society divided into two hostile camps, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, two classes that developed from earlier models:
From the serfs of the Middle ages sprang the chartered burghers of the earliest towns. From these burgesses the first elements of the bourgeoisie were developed.
Marx also believed that while history had a direction in which it was moving, it could be helped by revolutionary action, such as he called for in The Communist Manifesto or in writings addressed to the proletariat in Germany calling for an uprising against the bourgeoisie:
Brothers, already in 1848 we told you that the German liberal bourgeoisie would soon achieve control and at once turn its newly-won power against the workers. You have seen how this was fulfilled.
In response, the working class should undertakes a revolution against the petty bourgeoisie.
For Sigmund Freud, human nature is hidden in the mind and is produced by "the irremediable antagonism between the demands of instinct and the restrictions of civilization." Human nature in the state of nature is thus one thing, while human nature in civilization has been reshaped and produces a different form of alienation in the Freudian conception. As the individua
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1863
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)
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