A spectre is haunting europe: the spectre of Communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Czar, Metternich and Guizot, French radicals and German police-spies. Where is the party in question that has not been decried as communistic by its opponents in power? Where is the party that has not hurled back the branding reproach of communism, upon its more advanced opposition parties? Two things result from this fact. One, Communism is already acknowledged to be itself a world power. Two, it is high time communists should openly, in the face of the world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies; and meet this nursery tale of the spectre of communism with a manifesto of the party itself.
-Introduction to the Manifesto (Karl marx).