Communism Socialism Industrial capitalism Agricultural capitalism Feudalism Slave society Primitive communism Figure 1 4 The Marxist stages of history theory ACTIVITY Before you begin to work your way through this book try to find out a bit more about Marxism and its aims before Mao came to power in China When you have done so write a couple of sentences to explain to what extent you think its aims are a achievable and b desirable Marx s ideas inspired many revolutionaries including Mao in China he first attempt to put them into practice was made in Russia lowing the November 1917 Revolution After the Communist Evolution in 1949 Mao tried to adapt and apply these ideas to China Owever practice turned out to be very different from theory and ny have argued that the ideals of Communism have never yet been blemented anywhere This refers to the political and economic writings of one man Karl Marx 1818 83 or two men if Marx s close collaborator Friedrich Engels 1820 95 is included Marx s writings were based on the materialist conception of history that he developed and on his theory that human history was largely determined by the history of class struggles between ruling and oppressed classes which fundamentally had mutually exclusive or conflicting interests Panifest Kommunistischen Partei Ber ffentligt im Jebruar 1848 Proletarier aller L nder vereinigt ruch London Obra is bre Ciha her Bilbange 6eleillehelt f r Arbeite 1 C Ourghard 45 LITEL STAar B Figure 1 5 Front cover of The Communist Manifesto Marx believed that if the workers were successful in overthrowing capitalism they would then be able to construct a socialist society This would still be a class society but one in which for the first time in human history the ruling class would be the majority of the population From this new form of human society Marx believe it would be possible to move eventually to an even better one communism This mauld l