Was Karl Marx a positive or negative cultural figure?

I think Marx is one of those misunderstood philosophers that got a bad rap from people like the Soviet Union and North Korea. His idea of communism was a bit different from what these societies were trying to do. In fact, according to the communist manifesto, the United States has many of the points a communist society would be proposed to have. I think he had some good thoughts that look good on paper. But like any other ideology, it is inevitable that it will be misused and taken out of context. You aren't really going to find any other philosophical or political ideologies from him since a good chunk of his life's work was about communism. Marx wasn't trying to suppress people or shut them down (like many socialist societies try to do) but was simply trying to get rid of immoral behavior like materialism and greed.

Karl Marx (1818-1883) was the most important of all socialist thinkers and the creator of a system of thought called Marxism. He helped organize the international socialist movement. His ideas motivated radical political activists who joined his call to overthrow capitalism. Marxism argued that all events in history are caused by economic forces, especially class conflict between owners and workers. Marx depicted the inevitable evolution from feudalism to capitalism (which happened, he argued, during the French Revolution), to socialism, which was about to happen as soon as the workers got organized. Many intellectuals accepted Marx's "scientific" analysis and prediction. In recent decades there has been little interest in Marx among economists or historians, who nearly unanimously conclude his analysis was faulty and his predictions were wrong, but there is much more among critics of literature, especially in university English departments.

There is no perfect system for everyone everywhere. The writings and ideas of Karl Marx were very innovative for their time. Many great ideas came out, some of which were put into practice. Several poly-sci professors and authors have described Marx's ideas as an incredible dream of cooperation that is impossible in the real world.