Socialism granted a powerful language for the working-class to express their interests. Many workers, who were enfranchised in the latter portion of the century joined political parties espousing this doctrine. Socialism existed before Karl Marx presented himself to the scene. In fact, Marx drew from the theories of the foremost prophets of socialism: Henri de Saint-Simon and Charles Fourier in France, and Robert Owen in Great Britain. However, he gave these theories his own style, and in the end his form became the dominant idea of socialism. Karl Marx, the son of a lawyer, grew up in an industrializing area that was particularly open to political ideas and agitation. The Rhineland, in western Germany, had been influenced by ideas of the French Revolution and was primed for political radicalism. Marx, as a young man, studied philosophy at the University of Berlin and joined a group known as the "Young Hegelians," self-declared disciples of idealist G.W.F. Hegel. Marx showed an early interest in political liberty and socialism.

As Hegel believed that the goal of human history was the realization of the world spirit; Marx embraced the theory and believed it was the abolition of capitalism, the victory of the proletariat, the disappearance of the state, and the ultimate liberation of all humankind. Marx insisted that material conditions determined the governance of the world. Following Hegel, who said that truth evolves by a "dialectic method," Marx called his own philosophy "dialectic materialism." He posited a world of change but stated that it was embedded in material conditions, not in a clash of ideas. To Marx, ideas were merely a reflection of the material world.

ommunist Manifesto, in 1848. This pamphlet was an appeal to the working classes of the world, written specifically for the Communist League, a group of Germans living in exile. The pamphlet was too late and too obscure to influence the revolutions of 1848. However, it laid out Marx's basic principles, urging the proletariat to rise, proclaiming, "You have nothing left to lose but your chains." Marx's pen birthed numerous political and polemical works, but most went unpublished during his lifetime. The first volume of, Capital, his major work, was published in 1867. Marxism, the body of Karl Marx's thought, is complex and often contradictory. The style it was written in is obscure, difficult to penetrate. But throughout there are certain basic concepts that shine, which were understood

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