>>1
Liar.
But since I have some time to waste, here goes demagoguery:
As you should know it all started with Adam Smith. He wrote some philosophical stuff on economics blah blah blah.
Some time later Marx read it and extended the labour theory of value based on his historical materialism. Simplified it says that the value of everything is determined by the amount of labour involved in the production. Therefore he argued that production should be carefully planned to speed up the process and achieving a classless society/communism ahead of its time(in his eyes it was inevitable - a historical process). This extends to dictatorship of the proletariat, seizing means of production etc. etc.
Too bad for him that marginalism has largely replaced his economical theory (however, it also includes the labour theory of value to some extent) rendering everything based on it obsolete. The Russians still tried it and failed only a short time after only to change their policy to do-what-the-party-says.
Marxism is dead as of today. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union all former far left parties live on as populists doomed to saying nay to everything.
What you really want for your modern political ideas homework are the social democrats (or "liberals" in the US). They all started off as socialist opposition in democratic countries and gradually shifted to the right throughout history. All countries have a major party that is social democratic.