The political tract in which Marx presented the core of his philosophy and revolutionary program, with an introduction analyzing its significance to the realities of today and to Marx's own times.

The Iron Heel (1907) is a novel by American writer Jack London. A groundbreaking work of dystopian science fiction, The Iron Heel was, inspired by London's socialist views and belief in an eventual global upheaval. Although his predictions proved wrong for the United States of the early-twentieth century, London was, recognized by such figures as George Orwell for his foresight regarding the rise of fascism in Europe. The novel is, told from the perspective...

Schumpeter's Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy is perhaps the most important and influential book on the subject ever written. This volume is the result of an effort to weld into a readable form the bulk of almost forty years' thought, observation and research on the subject of socialism. The problem of democracy forced its way into the place it now occupies in this volume because it proved impossible to state my views on the relation between the...

The Communist Manifesto was first, published on February 21, 1848, and it is one of the world's most influential political tracts. Commissioned by the Communist League and written by communist theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, it laid out the League's purposes and program. The Manifesto suggested a course of action for a proletarian (working class) revolution to overthrow the ruling class of bourgeoisie and to eventually, bring about a classless...

"The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844" is the influential study of the hazards of the Industrial Revolution by the German philosopher Frederick Engels. This important contribution to the development of modern Socialism was written while Engels spent two years living in Manchester, England, the city traditionally viewed as where the Industrial Revolution began. Engels viewed England's productivity and efficiency in manufacturing to...

"1936: Shostakovich, just thirty, fears for his livelihood and his life. Stalin, hitherto a distant figure, has taken a sudden interest in his work and denounced his latest opera. Now, certain he will be exiled to Siberia (or, more likely, shot dead on the spot), he reflects on his predicament, his personal history, his parents, various women and wives, his children all of those hanging in the balance of his fate. And though a stroke of luck prevents...

When 17-year-old Pavol fatally sets himself on fire in Prague in 1969 to protest the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, his three best friends must figure out how to survive an oppressive regime without him--

The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality by Austrian School economist and libertarian thinker Ludwig von Mises is an investigation into the psychological roots of the anti-capitalistic stance that is widespread in the general populations of the capitalist world. Von Mises suggests various reasons for this mentality, primarily his claim that free competition in the market economy allows no excuses of one's failures. Rather, he argues, it creates great incentive...