In 1867 Marx publishes in Hamburg the first volume of Capital: a critique of political economy that follows the commodity to the factory floor and argues that capital accumulates by unpaid labor time. The book, slow to sell and faster to be argued over, becomes the tradition's central text; the second and third volumes follow from Marx's manuscripts under Engels's editorship.
Tagged: Marxism
The Event
- Date
- 1867 (exact)
- Era
- Marx; Standard periodization of Marxist history
- Location
- Hamburg; today Hamburg, Germany
- Traditions
- Marxism
- Streams
- Marxism
- Key figures
- Karl Marx
- Key texts
- Capital
Connections
Primary Sources
- Marx, Karl. Das Kapital, volume one. Hamburg: Meissner, 1867.
Secondary Sources
- Anderson, Perry. Considerations on Western Marxism. London: New Left Books, 1976.
- Kolakowski, Leszek. Main Currents of Marxism. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978.
- McLellan, David. Karl Marx: A Biography. London: Palgrave Macmillan, fourth edition, 2006.
Provenance: HIST-1452; confidence 0.95; accessed 2026-10-30.
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World View
Marxism
Marxism explains history as the struggle of classes over material production, and aims at a classless society in which exploitation and alienation are ended.