 Marx’s early writings are dominated by an understanding of alienation, a distinct type of social ill whose diagnosis looks to rest on a controversial account of human nature and its flourishing. He subsequently developed an influential theory of history—often called historical materialism—centred around the idea that forms of society rise and fall as they further and then impede the development of human productive power. Marx increasingly became preoccupied with an attempt to understand the contemporary capitalist mode of production, as driven by a remorseless pursuit of profit, whose origins are found in the extraction of surplus value from the exploited proletariat. The precise role of morality and moral criticism in Marx’s critique of contemporary capitalist society is much discussed, and there is no settled scholarly consensus on these issues. His understanding of morality may be related to his account of ideology, and his reflection on the extent to which certain widely-shared misunderstandings might help explain the stability of class-divided societies. In the context of his radical journalism, Marx also developed his controversial account of the character and role of the modern state, and more generally of the relation between political and economic life. Marx sees the historical process as proceeding through a series of modes of production, characterised by (more or less explicit) class struggle, and driving humankind towards communism. However, Marx is famously reluctant to say much about the detailed arrangements of the communist alternative that he sought to bring into being, arguing that it would arise through historical processes, and was not the realisation of a pre-determined plan or blueprint.