Classical political economists - Assignment Example

Karl Marx (1818-1883) is considered one of the most influential thinkers of his time, and a lot of modern day economics are based on his theories. One of his notable contributions is the modern political economic theory. Karl Marx spent a lot of time studying the capitalist system, after which he viewed it as one that deprives the working class off their rights and advocated for a commun­­ist system (Hunt 17). One of the most notable characteristics of Marx’s theories is the influence Smith and Ricardo had especially when it came to theories about value and profits.

According to Marx, most thinkers lacked historical perspective. He held the idea that production was a social activity taking various forms and modes based on the formation of social organization as well as their corresponding production techniques (Hunt 36). All epochs of production had similar characteristics, and their failure to differentiate what they had in common and what they did not have led to confusions and distortions among the thinkers. Most important among them was the claim that capital among all production systems it was a universal element and that all economic activity could be reduced to a series of exchanges.

This was because capital had one feature that was universal in all production and one feature particularly specific to capitalism “production”. Marx admitted that the claim (capital was a universal production element) was not possible without an instrument of production nor their production without stored up past labour. Capital is among other things, also an instrument of production, also objectified past labour. Therefore capital is a general, eternal relation of nature; that is, if I leave out just the specific quality, which alone makes “instruments of production” and “stored up labour” into capital”(Hunt 73).

Karl used this dialectal materialism theory to describe capitalism in that, within the dominance of the social class their