The German Ideology
The German Ideology is a collection of manuscripts written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in 1845–1846. Marx and Engels did not find a publisher, and the work went unpublished during their lifetimes. The book as it is known today is an editorial construction from the chaotic and untitled manuscripts, first published in their entirety in 1932 by the Marx-Engels Institute in Moscow.
The book is a major work of political and philosophical thought, considered the first to be recognizably "Marxist". In it, Marx and Engels articulate for the first time their materialist conception of history, also known as historical materialism. This new worldview posits that the material conditions of individuals' lives—specifically their mode of production—form the basis of society and that consciousness and ideas are products of these material realities, not the other way around. The famous formulation, "Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life," originates from this text.
A large portion of The German Ideology consists of detailed and often satirical polemics against some of their fellow German philosophers, particularly Ludwig Feuerbach, Bruno Bauer, and Max Stirner, as well as a critique of "True Socialism". Marx and Engels accused these "Young Hegelians" of engaging in a purely philosophical struggle against "phrases" rather than critiquing the real, material world from which those phrases arose.
The published book is typically divided into three parts, though the original manuscript was left incomplete and unrevised. Part I, "Feuerbach", contains the most systematic exposition of historical materialism and is the most frequently published and studied section. The book is considered a crucial text for understanding the development of Marxism, as it marks Marx and Engels's definitive break from German idealism and sets the foundation for their later economic and political works, including The Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital.
Background
The German Ideology was written during a period of intense intellectual development for both Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, representing a key moment of "self-clarification" and the synthesis of their new worldview. In 1846, it was the first work to be written that could be described as distinctly "Marxist". Its creation followed a series of earlier writings in which Marx and Engels progressively broke from the German idealism of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and the Young Hegelians.Marx's early work, particularly his essays in the Deutsch–Französische Jahrbücher, had already shifted the focus of critique from the state to "civil society". In "On the Jewish Question", Marx argued that genuine human emancipation required overcoming the division between the abstract political citizen and the egoistic individual of civil society, a sphere dominated by private interests and economic conflict. In his "Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right", Marx identified the proletariat for the first time as the historical agent capable of achieving this "universal emancipation".
The concept of alienation, central to Marx's Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, was also a crucial precursor. Marx rooted alienation not in consciousness but in the material process of labour under capitalism. He argued that under conditions of "alienated labour", the worker's own product confronts him as a hostile power, and the process of work itself becomes an external, oppressive activity. Crucially, Marx concluded that private property was not the cause but "the product, the result, the necessary consequence, of alienated labour".
Engels's work also provided a vital impetus. His 1844 essay, "Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy", published in the Jahrbücher, sparked Marx's intensive study of political economy. In July 1844, Engels met Marx in Paris, beginning their lifelong collaboration. Together they wrote The Holy Family, a polemic against the Young Hegelian Bruno Bauer, which contained hints of their developing dialectical approach to history, analyzing the proletariat and private property as a unified antithesis whose resolution required the abolition of both.
The German Ideology represents the culmination of this period. It was here that Marx and Engels made their definitive break from the humanism of Ludwig Feuerbach, whom they had previously admired. While Feuerbach had inverted Hegelianism by arguing that God was a human projection, Marx and Engels criticized him for remaining in the realm of abstract ideas and for viewing "Man" ahistorically. Instead, they formulated their materialist conception of history, arguing that human beings and their ideas are shaped not by abstract essences but by the concrete, material conditions of their lives, which they create and recreate through labour.
Writing and manuscript
The bulk of The German Ideology was written between November 1845 and the summer of 1846. The complete manuscript was a substantial work, comprising two large volumes totaling over 700 pages, the majority of which consisted of detailed, line-by-line polemics against contemporaries. The first volume was largely a critique of the views of Bruno Bauer and Max Stirner, while the second volume was dedicated to attacking the proponents of "True Socialism". The first section of Volume I, ostensibly a critique of Ludwig Feuerbach, was written later, in the second half of 1846, but was never completed.The project began as an effort to publish a quarterly journal. At the suggestion of Moses Hess, Marx and Engels were to co-author critiques for the journal, which was to be financed by two "true socialist" businessmen, Julius Meyer and Rudolph Rempel. In May 1846, the main part of the manuscript was sent from Brussels to Joseph Weydemeyer in Westphalia, who was to arrange for its publication. However, when the publishers expressed disapproval of the polemical content and later withdrew their financial backing, the project collapsed. Throughout 1846 and 1847, Marx and Engels made repeated but unsuccessful attempts to find another publisher in Germany. The failure was partly due to difficulties with the police and partly because publishers were reluctant to print the work, as their sympathies lay with the philosophical trends that Marx and Engels attacked.
Having failed to find a publisher, Marx and Engels abandoned the project. In a public declaration from 1847, Marx stated that he had left the materials "to the sleep of the just". He would later recall this episode in his 1859 book A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, writing: "we abandoned the manuscript to the gnawing criticism of the mice all the more willingly as we had achieved our main purpose—self-clarification." This statement highlights Marx's own view of the manuscripts as an unfinished work whose primary value was in the authors' own intellectual development. The manuscript remained unpublished during the authors' lifetimes.
The physical state of the manuscript was chaotic. It was a set of "very rough, discontinuous, and hitherto unwanted manuscripts" that were never revised into a finished book. Some pages were missing, and the text was filled with marginalia. The authors never completed or revised the work into a structured whole, posing a "considerable editorial problem" for later editors, who constructed the published versions of the text in the 20th century.
Content
The German Ideology is divided into a preface and three main parts, though the work as a whole is incomplete. Part I contains the foundational exposition of the materialist conception of history, while Parts II and III consist of extensive polemics.Part I: Critique of Modern German Philosophy
This part, subtitled "Opposition of the Materialist and Idealist Outlook," is the most well-known and widely read section of the book. It begins by satirizing the Young Hegelians, whom Marx and Engels dismiss as "philosophic heroes" who mistake their intellectual battles with ideas for world-changing revolutions. They argue that these critics, despite their "world-shattering" statements, remain "the staunchest conservatives" because they only fight against "phrases" and never challenge the real, material world that produces these phrases. According to Marx and Engels, the substantive arguments of their philosophy are developed "as political points through and through", in contrast to the abstract truths sought by the idealists.Materialist conception of history
In contrast to the idealist philosophy of their contemporaries, Marx and Engels present their new materialist method. Their starting point is not ideas, but "real individuals, their activity and the material conditions under which they live". This approach was a new form of materialism, distinct from what Marx called the "contemplative" materialism of Feuerbach. In his "Theses on Feuerbach", written shortly before The German Ideology, Marx had critiqued "all previous materialism" for viewing reality as an object of contemplation rather than as human "sensuous activity, practice".The new materialism defines "actuality" in terms of "sociality and history," where material conditions and human activity intersect in practice. The fundamental condition of all human history is the necessity for human beings to produce their means of subsistence.
This production of material life is the basis of society. The "mode of production" determines the social, political, and intellectual life of individuals. This relationship is famously summarized in the reversal of the Hegelian axiom: "Life is not determined by consciousness, but consciousness by life." "Civil society," which embraces the whole material intercourse of individuals, is identified as "the true source and theatre of all history". This view also entails a historicization of nature itself; Marx and Engels refer to "a historical nature and a natural history," arguing that the natural world in which humans live is one that has been fundamentally shaped by human industry.
The development of the productive forces gives rise to the division of labour, which in turn determines the forms of property. Marx and Engels outline a history of ownership, beginning with tribal property, moving to the communal and state property of antiquity, and then to the feudal or estate property of the Middle Ages.