There is no doubt whatsoever that the writings of Marx and Engels represent a colossal intellectual achievement; they are arguably the most significant single contribution to the analysis of the social relations characteristic of industrial capitalist societies. Their works dwarf those of later Marxists and of later social analysts. Their contribution is even more remarkable given the fact that it was produced in something of an intellectual vacuum. No contemporary of theirs either shared or even understood most of their work, and many of their writings were unpublished when Marx died in 1883 (see Anderson, 1976, ch. 1). Clearly there was an important political context for this work, but even this was intermittent, and indeed their work was produced before either the organisation of large industrial working classes into trade unions, or the emergence of the major socialist/social democratic political parties.