From Class Consciousness to Political Literacy: Revisiting Marx and Engels’ Communist Manifesto

Abstract

The Communist Manifesto (1848) is one of the most famous works by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. While there are several ways in which the text is conventionally studied in the context of capitalism, class struggle, revolution, historical materialism, and communist ideology, there is another important field from which it can be studied as it contributed to the formation of political consciousness. In this article, The Communist Manifesto is revisited and the conceptual shift is discussed that is from 'class consciousness' to ‘political literacy’. This study focuses exclusively on secondary research and uses a qualitative research design utilizing thematic analyses. The documentary basis of the research are books, peer-reviewed scientific papers, classic political books, works of Marxist and class consciousness, ideology, special issue of political education, citizenship, critical pedagogy and works on the contemporary capitalism. Literature was judiciously selected based on its theoretical and analytical connection. Thematic analysis reveals five essential themes that help to shape political awareness: class consciousness as a precondition for political awareness; class conflict as a way of understanding power; ideology as the critique of political reality; consciousness of the collective group as a factor of political awareness; and the sense of class as being transformed into a multidimensional political awareness in the contemporary context. The results suggest that The Communist Manifesto is a more than simply a revolutionary political discourse; it is also a significant historical instrument of political education. Marx and Engels attempt to link the particular experiences of economics to the larger relations of production, relations of property, classes, and power. In linking individual experiences of economics to the more general relations of production, property, classes and power, Marx and Engels promote a level of structural political understanding. However, modern political consciousness is not simply a class consciousness. There is a need to include also gender, race, ethnicity, environmental politics, globalization, citizenship, digital communication, and new forms of labour. Finally, the article suggests that the concept of class consciousness serves as an important intellectual platform for critical political literacy and current political literacy offers a wider platform for critical evaluation of the ongoing importance and shortcomings of Marx and Engels.