MARX'S CONCEPT OF FREEDOM

The first time that Marx uses the word "freedom" in the Communist Manifesto, he is not writing about freedom in general. Nor is he writing about particular political freedoms, such as the freedom of the press. He is instead writing about a kind of freedom specially connected with capitalism, free trade. To Marx, capitalism has "in place of the numberless, indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom -- Free Trade" (p. 11). Marx capitalizes the words, because he is hinting here that free trade is not only an idea, it is also a slogan, a symbol of what capitalism believes about itself.

What Marx is actually comparing free trade to, "numberless ... chartered freedoms," seems to be a reference to the Middle Ages. Freedom in those days existed in bits and pieces, granted by kings, or claimed by particular groups. People in one town might have the freedom to make beer, while people in the next town had the freedom to make cheese. These old freedoms were part of a whole web of traditional relationships, in which people lived their lives.

Capitalism, however, has swept away all of these old connections. Instead, "into their place stepped free competition, accompanied by a social and political constitution adapted to it, and by the economic and political sway of the bourgeois class" (p. 14). Under free trade and free competition, people in any town can legally make beer or cheese. However, this kind of freedom really only appli

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ay never sail on "your" ship, or even see it -- much less say hello to the deck mate as one human being to another. You own it and manage it purely as an instrument of capital, a profit-making piece of the worldwide system of production. Thus, according to Marx, "capital is therefore not a personal, it is a social, power" (p. 24). So, abolishing private property, to Marx, does not really mean that no one can have a sailboat. It means that the great machinery of production is in public hands, managed for the public good rather than for private gain. Abolishing private property in this sense has nothing to do with anyone's personal freedom: In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality. And the abolition of this state of things is called by the bourgeois, abolition of individuality and freedom! (p. 24). Here, Marx is returning in more detail to the point he made early on, that what capitalist society means by "freedom" is quite different from personal freedom. To be exact, "by freedom is meant, under the present bourgeois conditions of production, free trade, free selling and buying" (p. 25). These terms, however, came into use only by

Category: Economics - M