Industrial Revolution, social question, the rise of proletariat, and Karl Marx
By Riccardo Piroddi
Abstract: La rivoluzione industriale, avvenuta in Inghilterra tra la fine del XVIII e l’inizio del XIX secolo, segnò una trasformazione radicale dell’economia e della società. L’introduzione del sistema industriale e della produzione meccanizzata portò alla nascita di una nuova classe operaia – il proletariato – subordinata al potere capitalistico della borghesia. Questo processo si estese a tutta l’Europa, alimentando tensioni sociali, migrazioni urbane e dibattiti politici sul tema della “questione sociale”. Pensatori come Sismondi, Owen, Fourier e Proudhon criticarono l’ineguaglianza prodotta dal capitalismo industriale e proposero modelli alternativi basati su giustizia sociale, cooperazione e autogestione. In Germania, le risposte filosofiche alla crisi sociale si svilupparono attorno al pensiero hegeliano, dando vita a una frattura tra destra e sinistra hegeliana. Tra i critici più radicali emerse Karl Marx, che riformulò la dialettica in chiave materialista.
Secondo Marx, la storia è guidata dalla lotta di classe e la trasformazione della società può avvenire solo attraverso una rivoluzione del proletariato. Il capitalismo, basato sull’appropriazione del plusvalore e sulla mercificazione del lavoro, è per Marx destinato al collasso, aprendo la strada a una società comunista priva di classi. Sebbene non abbia indicato con precisione i meccanismi politici della transizione, Marx immaginò una fase intermedia – la dittatura del proletariato – necessaria per abbattere lo Stato borghese e realizzare una nuova forma di libertà collettiva.
The Industrial Revolution, which unfolded in England between the late 18th and early 19th centuries, marked a profound and irreversible transformation in economic and social life. The term “revolution” aptly describes the radical shift from small-scale artisanal production, where shop owners controlled all production factors (natural resources, capital, and labour), to large-scale factory systems. In this new model, workers had little to offer but their labour and were subject to the will of capitalists. This shift revolutionized the British economy and, in time, reshaped the entirety of Europe.
Great Britain’s powerful naval fleet played a crucial role in supporting this burgeoning industrial economy by enabling the export of goods on a global scale. The colonization of North America also bolstered Britain’s economic growth, with vast imports of tobacco and cotton—especially cotton, a critical raw material for the booming textile industry. These international trade networks allowed Britain to become the most industrialized and prosperous nation in Europe.
Scientific advancements further accelerated this industrial transformation. Inventions like mechanized spinning tools revolutionized the textile sector, enabling a dramatic increase in production speed compared to the manual loom. Additionally, the development of steam power, harnessed through coal (abundant in the English subsoil), proved vital for both industrial and transportation advances. This leap in steam technology also drove the steel industry forward, creating new opportunities for manufacturing and infrastructure.
Alongside these industrial advancements, English agriculture underwent significant changes, often referred to as the agricultural revolution. Innovations in crop rotation techniques, such as multi-year sowing cycles, improved agricultural yields, while the introduction of threshing machines reduced the physical burden on labourers. As agricultural productivity surged, food supplies expanded, leading to rapid population growth. This demographic explosion, coupled with the rise of industrial employment, caused a large-scale migration from rural areas to cities, where factories began replacing artisanal workshops.
By 1831, the year of Hegel’s death, a wave of social revolts began sweeping across Europe, fundamentally altering the political landscape. These uprisings were closely linked to the emergence of a new class—the proletariat, which ascended as a social and political force alongside the rise of the bourgeoisie. The term “proletarian,” first coined by Louis Auguste Blanqui, described individuals who survived solely on their labour, were politically disenfranchised, and relied on their own and their children’s work to sustain themselves. Blanqui argued that the proletarians were a subjugated class, exploited by the bourgeoisie who profited from their labour.
Hegel’s concept of the “plebs” provided a philosophical framework for understanding this growing class divide. The rapid expansion of industrial factories had created a vulnerable underclass of workers living in impoverished conditions, which in turn gave rise to the so-called “social question.” This term encapsulated the stark tension between the widespread poverty of the working masses and the dominance of capitalist bourgeois culture. The political and philosophical debates of this period were fuelled by efforts to address the social question through economic and social reforms, as well as by the emergence of early socialist and communist thought.
This social crisis, however, was not confined to England. It spread across France and Germany as well, becoming a central issue in the political discourse of Europe during this transformative era. The industrial revolution and the accompanying rise of the proletariat led to a series of debates on how to resolve the exploitation of labour and address the deepening inequality created by industrial capitalism.
Industrial Revolution’s thinkers
A significant early response to the contradictions emerging in industrial society came from Jean Charles de Sismondi (1773-1842), who rejected the notion that the industrial system naturally tended toward economic equilibrium between labour and capital, as dictated by the law of supply and demand. Sismondi criticized the economic policies born from liberalism, which he believed failed to account for the “human factor” in capitalist production. He argued that political power, as a form of social power, had the responsibility to address and mitigate the worsening social inequalities brought about by industrialization.
This call for reform was already evident in the Chartist movement of the 1830s and 1840s, where British workers demanded the creation of a Charter of Labour to ensure fairer working conditions and hours. The Chartists recognized that the industrial system had produced severe imbalances, and their movement was one of the first to formally challenge these inequities.
A similar critique is found in the work of Robert Owen (1771-1858), a textile engineer who, like Sismondi, sought to improve the conditions of industrial workers. Influenced by the liberal British culture of his time, Owen advocated for shorter working hours, fair wages, and healthier workplace environments, promoting what could be described as a “religion of work.” He sharply criticized traditional religious institutions, believing that an improvement in workers’ lives could be achieved through rational and humane industrial practices.
Charles Fourier (1772-1837), another contemporary critic of industrial capitalism, was disheartened by class struggles but recognized the inherent enslavement of workers within the capitalist system. To counter this, he proposed a form of spontaneous philanthropy led by a few enlightened and wealthy individuals. Fourier’s ideal was to create small, self-sustaining agricultural-industrial communities known as phalansteries. These communities would be guided by principles of equality and solidarity, where each member would perform work best suited to their individual aspirations, thereby harmonizing with the “true law of nature.”
A more pragmatic approach was taken by Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865), a leading advocate of worker self-management and a new socio-political order founded on the principle of “justice.” Proudhon is best known for his famous assertion that “property is theft,” arguing that social inequality stemmed from the accumulation of wealth by the ruling classes, which, in turn, incited collective and individual resistance, often leading to anarchy. For Proudhon, the solution to this inequality was to dismantle the existing capitalist structure and replace it with a system in which workers managed production themselves, ensuring that wealth and resources were distributed more equitably.
Each of these thinkers—Sismondi, Owen, Fourier, and Proudhon—offered distinct but interconnected critiques of industrial capitalism, seeking to address the social injustices and human suffering exacerbated by the rapid expansion of industrial society. Their ideas contributed to the broader discourse on economic and social reform during a time of profound upheaval.
The theories developed in Germany during the 19th century offered a profound and systematic response to the pressing “social question,” particularly in addressing the growing tensions between the rising bourgeoisie and the excluded proletariat. Friedrich Christoph Dahlmann (1785-1860) was among those who recognized the importance of reforming a political system in crisis. He focused on the emergence of an educated, individualistic middle class, the bourgeoisie, and saw the need for political reform. However, Dahlmann rejected revolutionary visions and instead advocated for the evolution of doctrines that respected the historical forms of power organization. His approach still left the proletariat politically marginalized.
A more radical critique emerged from the debates between the “right” and “left” Hegelians, two groups that splintered among Hegel’s followers. The “left” Hegelians, including prominent figures like Arnold Ruge, Ludwig Feuerbach, Bruno Bauer, and Karl Marx, engaged in a fierce critique of the existing political and social order. Their analysis began from the suffering and exploitation of workers, a perspective often referred to as the “dialectic of the feet,” because it started with the conditions of those at the bottom of society. These thinkers sought to challenge the established structures of power by highlighting the inhumane treatment of the working class.
In contrast, the “right” Hegelians saw the historically given political order as a rational and inevitable manifestation of reason, arguing for a “dialectic of the head.” They maintained that the existing system, despite its flaws, was the ultimate expression of reason and thus should be preserved and refined rather than overturned.
While socialist ideas were beginning to take root in Germany, there was also growing skepticism about the rise of Communism. Lorenz von Stein (1815-1890) played a crucial role in analysing the proletariat’s movement and the potential threats it posed to the established social order. However, von Stein did not oppose social revolution per se. Instead, he envisioned a peaceful transformation through the development of a science of society—what would later evolve into sociology. His goal was to understand and manage the tensions between capital and labour, which he identified as the root of social inequality. Rather than advocating for violent upheaval, von Stein sought to create the conditions for a gradual and non-traumatic integration of the proletariat into the established social fabric.
Von Stein’s ideas were instrumental in shaping the early development of sociology and economic science. His reform-oriented approach made a significant contribution to understanding the complexities of modern industrial society and offered a framework for reconciling the interests of capital and labour within the broader historical context. This laid the groundwork for more sophisticated analyses of social dynamics and economic inequalities, further influencing later theoretical developments in both disciplines.
Karl Marx
While Hegel envisioned the State as a vertical entity, representing a dialectical development of the Idea from above, which culminates in the ethical manifestation of law, Karl Marx (1818-1883) presented a radically different, horizontal conception. For Marx, the driving force of history and politics is not the abstract rational Idea, as Hegel suggested, but the people—specifically, the proletariat, which Hegelian philosophy had largely ignored. Marx saw the Hegelian dialectic of the “leader” as a dangerous illusion that idealized individual freedom in an abstract sense, detached from material conditions. In contrast, Marxist dialectics emphasize collective freedom and solidarity, arguing that the true realization of freedom can only occur through the pursuit of the common good.
Marx attributed the stark economic and social inequalities among citizens to systemic institutional injustice perpetuated by the State. The State, he argued, not only guarantees but actively preserves this injustice, as the ruling classes have no interest in relinquishing the privileges they derive from parasitic rents and the exploitation of the lower classes.
Marx’s contributions can be understood across three distinct yet interconnected domains:
- As a philosopher, Marx sought to ground ethical principles in concrete human action rather than in abstract theorization. He emphasized praxis, or revolutionary action, as the means of achieving collective ethics. By doing so, Marx sought to overturn the abstract idealism of thinkers like Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, focusing instead on practical, lived realities. For Marx, ethics could only be realized through the transformation of material conditions, especially via revolution, which would establish justice and equality
- As a historian, Marx viewed history as a cyclical struggle between classes. He rejected the idealist view that cultural and ideological systems are autonomous or neutral, arguing instead that these systems exist to justify and maintain the domination of the ruling classes. Marx insisted that history should be understood primarily through the lens of class struggle, with the goal of proletarian revolution driven by the development of class consciousness. Such a revolution, according to Marx, was necessary to dismantle the structures of oppression and exploitation, ultimately leading to a society where justice and freedom are equally distributed. History, in this sense, is the history of civil society, but it must be examined in connection with the economy—particularly the ownership of the means of production, which is the primary source of exploitation and inequality
- As an economist, Marx analysed the deep structural inequalities inherent in the capitalist system. He argued that these inequalities stemmed from the process of capital accumulation, in which the bourgeoisie, as the owners of capital and productive resources, systematically enriched themselves at the expense of the working class. In Marx’s view, the capitalist mode of production inherently devalues labour, as workers are not adequately compensated for the value they produce. Instead, the bourgeois class accumulates wealth through rents and profits, intensifying the gap between the owners of capital and the labourers. For Marx, the economic structure of capitalism is thus the root cause of inequality, exploitation, and class division.
In summary, Karl Marx’s multi-faceted approach as a philosopher, historian, and economist made him one of the most incisive critics of capitalist society. He saw the liberation of the proletariat and the establishment of a classless society as essential to achieving genuine freedom and justice for all. His theories not only critiqued the capitalist system but also laid the foundation for future socialist and communist movements, aiming to transform society through revolutionary change.
At the heart of Karl Marx’s critique is the fundamental conflict between the “rich classes”—the bourgeoisie, who control the economic and political mechanisms of the State and institutions—and the “poor classes,” particularly the proletariat, who are victims of what Marx calls “legalized injustice.” The superstructures, such as the State, exist primarily to serve those with economic power, perpetuating inequality. While Marx’s thought is deeply influenced by Hegel’s dialectical rigor, he diverged significantly by formulating a socio-historical framework rooted in the material realities of the lower classes, known as historical materialism.
Marx’s objective was concrete: to analyse and address the crisis of the capitalist system, making his work not just a philosophical treatise, but a response to the pressing issues of his time. His ideas have had enduring significance, continuing to fuel debates among economists, jurists, political scientists, and sociologists.
A key element of Marx’s break from Hegel lies in his critique of civil society. For Hegel, civil society was characterized by individual self-interest and competition. Marx saw this as a battleground for the ongoing struggle between two major classes: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. He argued that human rights, as they existed under the capitalist State, were not universal but were instead aligned with the interests of the bourgeoisie. The State, in this sense, reinforced the domination of the wealthy classes and ensured the continuation of economic inequalities.
Marx’s critique of the State extends to the phenomenon of alienation, whereby individuals become consumed by selfishness and disconnected from the collective needs of their community. This alienation occurs not only in the economic realm but also in the political and social spheres. For Marx, true political liberation could only come through human liberation, and this required a comprehensive critique of both bourgeois society and the capitalist economy.
The ultimate goal of Marxist philosophy is to demonstrate the necessity of a revolution that abolishes bourgeois domination and the capitalist system. Marx advocated for the establishment of communism, which he defined as a regime where the appropriation of the fruits of labour by one class is no longer possible. By abolishing private property, communism would prevent any group from accumulating wealth unjustly through the exploitation of others’ labour, particularly by eliminating the extraction of surplus value—the excess value produced by workers that is captured by capitalists as profit.
In Marx’s vision, communism would be based on a new way of organizing and compensating labour, where productive factors, especially labour, are recognized for their true value. This system would ensure that wealth is distributed equitably and that no class can monopolize the benefits of production, thus paving the way for a society free from class oppression and economic exploitation.
According to Karl Marx, history is defined by a cyclical sequence of events that ultimately reflect the ongoing class struggle. For Marx, this process will culminate in the establishment of communism, marking the end of the antagonistic phase born out of class conflicts. His theory of historical materialism is key to understanding this progression. It posits that the driving force behind historical change is the material conditions of human life, particularly the socio-economic relationships that structure society at any given time. Consequently, any cultural formation or ideology that does not align with this materialist analysis is merely a tool used to legitimize and perpetuate the existing relations of domination between classes.
Marxism is grounded in a materialist vision of society, which views history through the lens of a dialectic between the structure—the necessary conditions for individual and societal growth—and the superstructure—those elements, such as the State, that hinder progress and exist to maintain the power of the ruling classes. For Marx, the State is a sovereign apparatus that enforces the will of the bourgeoisie, perpetuating the capitalist system and stifling social, economic, and political development for the working class.
Using a framework similar to Hegel’s dialectic, Marx theorized that a proletarian revolution is necessary to overthrow the ideologies that sustain class divisions. Once the development of the productive forces, particularly the rising class consciousness of workers, reaches a point of conflict with the capitalist mode of production, a revolutionary moment arises. In this scenario, the superstructure—the institutions and ideologies upheld by the bourgeoisie—collapses, allowing for the dismantling of capitalist relations of production.
The acquisition of class consciousness by the proletariat is central to this revolutionary process. For Marx, the consciousness of the class struggle is the starting condition for the proletariat’s revolution. Only when workers understand their exploitation and the systemic nature of class oppression can they take political action to overthrow the bourgeois State. This idea is vividly portrayed in The Communist Manifesto, where Marx and Engels describe the plight of the proletariat and call for a unified revolutionary effort to dismantle the capitalist system.
Furthermore, Marx’s theory rejects other forms of socialism, such as utopian or egalitarian socialism, which he views as insufficient because they fail to recognize the historical-dialectical process that underpins societal transformation. According to Marx, only through the dialectical progression of history—wherein the proletariat overthrows the bourgeoisie—can true socialism and communism be realized. This process is not merely a vision of equality but the necessary outcome of material conditions and class struggle.
Marx was convinced that the capitalist system was on the verge of a general crisis, which would ultimately lead to its collapse. He believed that this crisis would create the conditions for the proletariat to seize power and dismantle the bourgeois regime once and for all. For Marx, this revolutionary upheaval was not only inevitable but also the only path toward a classless, communist society, in which the means of production would be collectively owned and operated for the benefit of all.
Initially, Karl Marx’s belief in the imminent collapse of capitalism and the rise of communism seemed confirmed by the revolutionary uprisings of 1848. However, the subsequent restoration of the monarchy in France under Napoleon III starkly contradicted the predictions laid out in The Communist Manifesto. Disillusioned by this political setback, Marx withdrew from direct political engagement and turned his focus to developing his theoretical framework. His systematic writings—including Das Kapital and Fundamentals of a Critique of Political Economy, along with numerous posthumous manuscripts—reveal a set of core concepts around which Marx structured his critique of capitalism. These key ideas include:
- Commodity Fetishism: in a capitalist system, commodities possess both a human value and a use value. However, Marx argued that capitalism prioritizes exchange value, reducing the commodity to an abstract quantity of human labour. This focus on exchange value distorts social relations, turning them into relations between things, as the price of a commodity becomes detached from the human labour that produced it. Commodities thus appear to have intrinsic value, obscuring the social relationships involved in their production
- Reification: beyond the exchange economy, capitalist domination also relies on the exploitation of labour. This is achieved by reducing the workforce to a mere commodity that can be bought and sold in the market. Workers, under this system, become alienated from their own labor, as it is commodified and valued only in terms of market exchange
- The Workforce: human labour, commodified through employment contracts, becomes quantifiable in capitalist production. The value of labour is measured in wages, which represent the price of the worker’s capacity to work. Labor is thus reduced to a tradable unit, essential for the capitalist production process
- Surplus Labor and Surplus Value: surplus value, the cornerstone of Marx’s economic theory, arises directly from the exploitation of labour. It represents the additional value produced by workers beyond the labour necessary to create a commodity. In this sense, surplus labour creates surplus value, which forms the capitalist’s profit. This surplus is derived from unpaid labour, as workers are compensated only for the basic cost of their labour power, not for the additional value they produce. For Marx, the class struggle revolves around the fight for just compensation, as workers materially produce the commodity but receive only a fraction of its true value.
In Marx’s analysis, the growing socialization of labour—where production becomes increasingly collective and interconnected—intensifies the tension between the private appropriation of surplus value by capitalists and the inherently social nature of production. This contradiction, he believed, would create the conditions necessary for a transition to communism, as workers collectively come to realize their exploitation.
Despite his thorough critique of capitalism, Marx left unresolved questions about the specific political mechanisms that would drive the transition to communism. He did not provide a detailed theoretical model for how this transformation would occur. However, the brief experiment of the Paris Commune in 1871, following the fall of Napoleon III, provided Marx with new insights and reflections on revolutionary action. The Commune’s attempt to implement worker-led governance, though short-lived, reinforced Marx’s belief that the proletariat could, under certain conditions, rise to challenge the capitalist system. Nonetheless, the exact path to achieving a lasting communist society remained a point of ambiguity in his thought.
In the work Critique of the Gotha Programme the thesis of the dictatorship of the proletariat is affirmed, understood as a moment of transition from capitalist to communist society with the aim of cancelling the superstructure of the State.
According to Marx, the dictatorship of the proletariat is the intermediate stage between the rule of the bourgeoisie and the classless society.
