In our exploration of the fundamental concepts of historical materialism so far, we have looked closely at the economic and material base of society. We’ve talked about the forces and relations of production that make up a mode of production. But every mode of production which forms the base of society has a superstructure that arises from it and in turn reinforces it. So, let’s look now at what the superstructure is and the relationship between it and the base.
Much is made of what is often referred to as the urban/rural divide. There is a fundamental disconnect, we are told, between the people from the cities and the rural population. Marx and Engels called this contradiction the division between town and country. Marxism-Leninism can help us understand this contradiction, how it arose historically, and how it can be overcome.
Since the very origin of class society, when the productive forces developed to the point of producing some surplus beyond bare subsistence, the contradiction between mental and manual labor has been a characteristic of productive relations. Broadly speaking this means that the majority of people toil away physically, while a small minority conducts intellectual labor, such as science and art or planning and administration. Historically, this contradiction arose alongside the contradiction between town and country, specifically when the cities of the ancient slave societies came to dominate society.
With the successful conclusion of the 9th Congress of Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO), a real leap has been made in our efforts to build a serious, revolutionary organization that can make meaningful contributions to the people’s struggle. It is also clear that we are continuing to make progress in our efforts to construct a new communist party, one that can stand at the forefront of the fight for socialism.
Now that we’ve nailed down what we mean by forces of production, let’s talk about the other aspect of the mode of production: the relations of production. Remember that the forces of production are comprised of the means of production (the instruments of production, such as factories and tools, and the objects of labor, like raw materials, land and natural resources) and the agents of production (the workers themselves and their techniques of labor).
Up to now we have studied dialectical materialism and given a general overview of its application to history, historical materialism. Now let’s look more closely at some of the core concepts that make up Marxism’s materialist conception of history, starting with the forces of production.
The cornerstone of historical materialism is class struggle as the motor driving historical change. So, what is the role of labor in historical development?
Now that we have talked about the Marxist theory of knowledge and examined the meaning and function of dialectical materialism, let’s look at how that is applied to studying the historical development of society. Marx called this “the materialist conception of history,” or historical materialism. It is historical materialism that demonstrates the link between dialectical materialism and political economy. Here we have dialectical materialism applied to history.
