by The Critical Theorists Who Diagnosed the Contradictions of Industrial Capitalism
This nomination for Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, whose collaborative work provided the most comprehensive and influential critique of industrial capitalism. In works like “The Communist Manifesto” (1848) and “Das Kapital,” they analyzed capitalism as a dynamic but self-destructive system based on the exploitation of labor (extracting surplus value) and prone to crises. Their theory of dialectical materialism viewed history as a series of class struggles, predicting capitalism’s eventual overthrow. While their proposed solutions led to vastly different political systems, their critical diagnosisof alienation, inequality, boom-bust cycles, and the relentless drive for capital accumulationproved enduringly insightful. Marx and Engels proved that business and economics cannot be understood in isolation from power and social relations, and that a systemic critique of capitalism’s foundations would become a central force in global politics, labor movements, and intellectual life for the next two centuries.
