The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State

The family, private property, and the state - the basic institutions of capitalist society - are neither "natural" nor everlasting. They are the product of specific economic and social conditions.

Fredrick Engels, a founder with Karl Marx of the modern workers' movement, traces the evolution of these institutions from the dawn of class society until today.

He shows how the oppression of women as a sex begins with the development of private property, and how the development of the modern working class creates the material basis to end that oppression.

This edition of Engels's pioneering work includes an introduction by Evelyn Reed, author of Woman's Evolution.