Socialism: Utopian and Scientific

Karl Marx (1818-1883) was a German economist, philosopher, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. Along with Engels, he developed the Marxist school of socialism, of which he is the namesake. Today, he is considered one of the most influential figures in human history; his work is foundational to the development of modern social science and modern leftism. Most famously, he is the author of The Communist Manifesto (1848). Marx’s far-left values and posthumous influence on totalitarian world leaders like Joseph Stalin (1878-1953) have made him a notoriously divisive figure in academia and politics.

Because of their close personal, professional, and intellectual relationships, Engels’s work is saturated with Marx’s influence. In Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, Marx’s presence is explicit: He wrote the first preface, and Engels directly quotes extensive passages from Capital: Critique of Political Economy, as well as their cowritten work, The Holy Family. Socialism: Utopian and Scientific draws much of its ideological framework and vocabulary from Capital, which laid the foundation for historical materialism. Although Marx only lived to publish the first volume of Capital, Engels organized Volumes II-III and published them posthumously.

Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon (1760-1825) was a French socialist theorist who is cited as a key influence on the foundation of Marxism. The liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill—who is among the most influential English-speaking philosophers in history—also cited Saint-Simon as an influence, as did the founder of Anarchism, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. Saint-Simon’s identification of stratified socioeconomic classes strongly influenced the works of Engels and Marx. Unlike Marxists, however, Saint-Simon was not anti-capitalist; his socioeconomic values were largely motivated by a desire to minimize idleness and increase productivity.

Saint-Simon is the first of the three utopian socialists introduced in Socialism: Utopian and Scientific. While this text explicitly favors the latter over the former, Engels still regards the utopian socialists with respect. He praises Saint-Simon as a canny precursor to modern Socialism: “[A]lmost all the ideas of later Socialists that are not strictly economic are found in him in embryo” (44). He takes a particular interest in Saint-Simon’s identification of complex antagonisms between social classes: “[T]o recognize the French Revolution as a class war, and not simply one between nobility and bourgeoisie, but between nobility, bourgeoisie, and the non-possessors, was, in the year 1802, a most pregnant discovery” (43). Ultimately, Engels regards Saint-Simon’s work as foundational to Marxist thought. However, he also identifies it as an immature precursor to modern socialism, which—while prescient—was ultimately a product of its time.

François Marie Charles Fourier (1772-1837) was a French philosopher and early adopter of socialism. As Engels points out, he is a founding utopian socialist. Fourier’s economic and social values echo modern Marxian Socialism. He identified poverty as the root of societal ills and viewed cooperation as the key to societal success. He was also highly concerned with human rights and liberty.

As with Saint-Simon, Engels praises Fourier for his thorough sociopolitical critique. Socialism: Utopian and Scientific draws from Fourier’s four-stage division of societal history, which is reflected in Engels’s three stages of industrial development. Likewise, Engels approves of Fourier’s censure of the “material and moral misery of the bourgeois world” (44), as well as his pioneering of women’s liberation. Along with his philosophical work and personal values, Engels endorses Fourier’s wit, “mordant sarcasm,” and satirical works.

Robert Owen (1771-1858) was a Welsh textile manufacturer, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and social reformer credited as a founding utopian socialist. Owen became wealthy through his management of the New Lanark Mill in Lanarkshire. He observed that the mill’s working conditions were unsatisfactory and began to pursue factory reform through political advocacy. He also installed non-corporal behavior management systems at Lanark Mill, which was uncommon in factories at the time. In the 1810s, Owen developed a model for a “New Moral World” which proposed a communist reorganization of society. Due to glaring oversights, Owen’s experiments met with extensive criticism and were never implemented.

In Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, Engels praises Owen’s advocacy and compassion on behalf of his workers. He characterizes Owen as a man bent on increasingly radical social reformations at great personal cost. He respects Owen as an ideological predecessor and as an advocate for workers’ interests, but he also criticizes Owenite socialism as insufficient and impractical.