“What are the best books about Karl Marx and Marxism?” We looked at 229 of the top Books About Marx books, aggregating and ranking them so we could answer that very question!

The top 22 titles, all appearing on 2 or more “Best Karl Marx” book lists, are ranked below by how many lists they appear on. The remaining 200+ titles, as well as the lists we used are in alphabetical order at the bottom of the page.

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Top 22 Books About Karl Marx

22 .) Manifesto

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• Ranker
• Verso Books

Originally published in German (as Manifest der kommunistischen Partei) just as the revolutions of 1848 began to erupt, the Manifesto has since been recognized as one of the world’s most influential political manuscripts. It presents an analytical approach to the class struggle (historical and present) and the problems of capitalism and the capitalist mode of production, rather than a prediction of Communism’s potential future forms. The Communist Manifesto contains Marx and Engels’ theories about the nature of society and politics, that in their own words, “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles”. It also briefly features their ideas for how the capitalist society of the time would eventually be replaced by socialism, and then finally Communism.

21 .) On the Jewish Question

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• Goodreads
• Wikipedia

Karl Marx’s views on the Jews Question and Zionism…

20 .) Surveys from Exile

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• Verso Books

19 .) The Class Struggles in France 1848–1850

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Marx’s first full application of historical materialism to an ongoing event. He analyzes the first sharp class conflict of capitalism and shows how the developing working class can lead other social strata to socialism.

18 .) The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte

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• Goodreads
• Wikipedia

The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte” is one of Karl Marx’ most profound and most brilliant monographs. It may be considered the best work extant on the philosophy of history. On the 18th Brumaire (Nov. 9th), the post-revolutionary development of affairs in France enabled the first Napoleon to take a step that led with inevitable certainty to the imperial throne. The circumstance that fifty and odd years later similar events aided his nephew, Louis Bonaparte, to take a similar step with a similar result, gives the name to this work-“The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte.

17 .) The First International and After

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• Verso Books

16 .) The German Ideology

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• The Guardian

Originally published by the Marx-Engels Institute in Moscow in 1939. “The German Ideology” was written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels circa 1846, but published later. The original edition was divided into thr 2011 Reprint of 1939 Edition. Parts I & III of “The German Ideology”. Full facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition Software. Originally published by the Marx-Engels Institute in Moscow in 1939. “The German Ideology” was written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels circa 1846, but published later. The original edition was divided into three parts. Part I, the most significant, is perhaps the classic statement of the Marxist theory of history and his much cited “materialist conception of history”.

15 .) The Holy Family

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This is a challenging December for Martin Halsey, a New York talent agent. Catholic faith was a key source of insight for Martin as a young man. But when puzzlement overtook insight, he chose atheism and gave his full commitment to his true passions—his work and family. An acute tragedy, however, has caused Martin to reconsider his choice. In The Holy Family, Thanksgiving proceeds to Christmas as Martin revisits his evolution from belief to unbelief against the backdrop of his early faith, his marriage, career, and family, and a controversial painting of the Holy Family by his daughter Celia. In the face of deep loss, Martin struggles with the question: Do I renew my faith and accept its promises, or stand firm with the sensual, finite love of a world without God? Engaging and timely, The Holy Family ventures into contentious waters but transcends the shouting and welcomes the search.

14 .) The Marx-Engels Reader

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• Goodreads
• List Muse

13 .) The Poverty of Philosophy

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• Wikipedia

The Poverty of Philosophy criticizes the economic and philosophical arguments of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon set forth in The System of Economic Contradictions, or The Philosophy of Poverty. Marx specifically accuses Proudhon of wanting to rise above the bourgeoisie. In the history of Marx’s thought and Marxism, this work is pivotal in the distinction between the Marxist concepts of utopian socialism and scientific socialism.

12 .) Theses on Feuerbach

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Nearly two years before his powerful Communist Manifesto, Marx (1818-1883) co-wrote The German Ideology in 1845 with friend and collaborator Friedrich Engels expounding a new political worldview, including positions on materialism, labor, production, alienation, the expansion of capitalism, class conflict, revolution, and eventually communism. They chart the course of “true” socialism based on Hegel’s dialectic, while criticizing the ideas of Bruno Bauer, Max Stirner and Ludwig Feuerbach. Marx expanded his criticism of the latter in his now famous Theses on Feuerbach, found after Marx’s death and published by Engels in 1888. Introduction to the Critique of Political Economy, also found among the posthumous papers of Marx, is a fragment of an introduction to his main works.

11 .) Wages, Price and Profit

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CONTENTS: Preliminary Production and Wages Production, Wages, Profits Wages and Currency Supply and Demand Wages and Prices Value and Labour Labouring Power Production of Surplus Value Value of Labour Profit Is Made by Selling a Commodity at its Value The Different Parts into Which Surplus Value Is Decomposed General Relation of Profits, Wages and Prices Main Cases of Attempts at Raising Wages or Resisting Their Fall The Struggle Between Capital and Labour and its Results Notes

10 .) A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy

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• Wikipedia

A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (German: Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie) is a book by Karl Marx, first published in 1859. The book is mainly an analysis of capitalism, achieved by critiquing the writings of the leading theoretical exponents of capitalism at that time: these were the political economists, nowadays often referred to as the classical economists; Adam Smith (1723–90) and David Ricardo (1772–1823) are the foremost representatives of the genre. Much of the Critique was later incorporated by Marx into his magnum opus, Capital (Volume I), published in 1867; and the Critique is generally considered to be of secondary importance among Marx’s writings. This does not apply, however, to the Preface of the Critique. It contains the first connected account of one of Marx’s main theories: the economic interpretation of history. Briefly, this is the idea that economic factors – the way people produce the necessities of life – conditions the kind of politics and ideology a society can have.

9 .) Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation

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• List Muse
• The Guardian
• Verso Books

CALIBAN AND THE WITCH is a history of the body in the transition to capitalism. Moving from the peasant revolts of the late Middle Ages to the witch-hunts and the rise of mechanical philosophy, Federici investigates the capitalist rationalization of social reproduction. She shows how the battle against the rebel body and the conflict between body and mind are essential conditions for the development of labor power and self-ownership, two central principles of modern social organization.

8 .) Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right

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This book is a complete translation of Marx’s critical commentary on paragraphs 261-313 of Hegel’s major work in political theory. In this text Marx subjects Hegel’s doctrine on the internal constitution of the state to a lengthy analysis. It was Marx’s first attempt to expose & criticize Hegel’s philosophy in general & his political philosophy in particular. It also represents his early efforts to criticize existing political institutions & to clarify the relations between the political & economic aspects of society. The Critique provides textual evidence in support of the argument that Marx’s early writings don’t exhibit radically different doctrinal principles & theoretical & practical concerns from his later work. This edition also includes a translation of the introduction Marx wrote for his proposed revised version of the Critique which he never completed. In a substantial introduction, Prof. O’Malley provides valuable information on Marx’s intellectual development.

7 .) Das Kapital

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• Goodreads
• List Muse
• Wikipedia

Das Kapital, Karl Marx’s seminal work, is the book that above all others formed the twentieth century. From Kapital sprung the economic and political systems that at one time dominated half the earth and for nearly a century kept the world on the brink of war. Even today, more than one billion Chinese citizens live under a regime that proclaims fealty to Marxist ideology. Yet this important tome has been passed over by many readers frustrated by Marx’s difficult style and his preoccupation with nineteenth-century events of little relevance to today’s reader. Here Serge Levitsky presents a revised version of Kapital, abridged to emphasize the political and philosophical core of Marx’s work while trimming away much that is now unimportant. Pointing out Marx’s many erroneous predictions about the development of capitalism, Levitsky’s introduction nevertheless argues for Kapital’s relevance as a prime example of a philosophy of economic determinism that “subordinates the problems of human freedom and human dignity to the issues of who should own the means of production and how wealth should be distributed.” Here then is a fresh and highly readable version of a work whose ideas provided inspiration for communist regimes’ ideological war against capitalism, a struggle that helped to shape the world today.

6 .) Economic & Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844

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Serving as the foundation for Marx’s indictment of capitalism is his extraordinary work titled Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts, written in 1844 but published nearly a century later. Here Marx offers his theory of human nature and an analysis of emerging capitalism’s degenerative impact on man’s sense of self and his creative potential. What is man’s true nature? How did capitalism gain such a foothold on Western society? What is alienation and how does it threaten to undermine the proletariat?

5 .) Grundrisse: Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy

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• Wikipedia

Written during the winter of 1857-8, the Grundrisse was considered by Marx to be the first scientific elaboration of communist theory. A collection of seven notebooks on capital and money, it both develops the arguments outlined in the Communist Manifesto (1848) and explores the themes and theses that were to dominate his great later work Capital. Here, for the first time, Marx set out his own version of Hegel’s dialectics and developed his mature views on labour, surplus value and profit, offering many fresh insights into alienation, automation and the dangers of capitalist society. Yet while the theories in Grundrisse make it a vital precursor to Capital, it also provides invaluable descriptions of Marx’s wider-ranging philosophy, making it a unique insight into his beliefs and hopes for the foundation of a communist state.

4 .) The Civil War in France

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A reprint of the 1934 ‘enlarged edition’, a volume that added newly translated material to the title essay. It includes an introduction by Engels [Do you want to know that this dictatorship of the proletariat looks like? Then look at the Paris Commune. That was the dictatorship of the proletariat], Marx’s first and second ‘Manifesto On The Franco-Prussian War’, the correspondence of Marx & Engels on the Commune, and Engels’ ‘The Program of the Blanquist Fugitives from the Paris Commune’.

3 .) Value: The Representation of Labour in Capitalism

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• Ranker
• Verso Books
• Wikipedia

This republication of a long out-of-print collection of essays, first published in 1979, focuses on the elusive concept of “value.” The field of study surrounding the theory of value remains comparatively sparse in Anglophone circles, and the essays here aim to answer the question, “Why is Marx’s theory of value important?”

2 .) Wage Labour and Capital

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• Goodreads
• Goodreads
• Wikipedia

Using WAGE LABOUR AND CAPITAL, Marx examined the ideas that were expressed in a very thorough economic framework and started to show an increased scientific rationale on his ideas of alienated labor, which in his perspective would eventually lead to the working class revolution. Marx also presented the distinct differences between labour and labour power and how the economic principles of supply and demand affected the pricing of certain commodities. Marx further explored how capital via capitalism to gain more of it.

1 .) Critique of the Gotha Program

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The 200+ Additional Best Books About Marxism

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