In the 1850s and early 1860s, when the workers' movement was still recovering from the defeats of 1848, Marx's prolific journalism from London offered a constant commentary on all the significant developments of the day. He began to interpret the British political scene and express his considered views on Germany, Poland and Russia, the Crimean War and the American Civil War, imperialism in India and China, and a host of other key issues. The Class Struggles in France develops the theories outlined in The Communist Manifesto into a rich and revealing analysis of contemporary events, while The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte contains equally stimulating reflections on Louis Napoleon's coup d'état of 1851.
KARL MARX was not only the great theorist of capitalism; he was above all else a revolutionary. In Paris in 1844 he made the connection between radical philosophy and the proletariat that would guide his future work, first with the Communist League and later with the International Workingmen's Association. Marx's Political Writings display a profound understanding of history and politics that is still relevant to the very different conditions of today.