The German philosophers K. Marx (1818 - 1883) and F. Engels (1820 - 1895) tried to transform the doctrine of socialism from utopian to scientific, i.e. substantiate the inevitability of socialism by the laws of development of the capitalist system itself.
K. Marx and F. Engels relied on a materialistic understanding of the historical process, proclaiming: "Being determines consciousness." They saw the main driving force behind the development of societies and states in the objective needs of large groups of people, and not in the subjective aspirations and desires of individuals. Material reproduction of people's lives determines the form of communication between them (i.e., both society and the state). The research method in Marxism is materialistic dialectics.
The foundations of a Marxist materialist understanding of society and the state developed by the mid-40s. XIX century.
The doctrine of the basis and superstructure.The Marxist view of the political system is determined by the doctrine of the basis and superstructure.
Basis - socio-economic relations. Superstructure - state, ideology, culture, etc.
Superstructure phenomena depend on the basic ones, since the superstructure must correspond to the basis. Simply put, according to the ideas of K. Marx and F. Engels, the political regime depends, ultimately, on the way of managing.
The basis (socio-economic relations) develops dialectically under the influence of internal factors - contradictions hidden in the net. (Recall that the unity and struggle of opposites is a source of development, from the point of view of dialectics). Changes in the basis lead to a change in the superstructure.
However, Marx and Engels did not deny that politics (superstructure) has some autonomy and can affect the basis. However, they nevertheless brought to the forefront precisely socio-economic relations.
Consider in more detail what a basis is and what patterns are inherent in it.
The basis of people's lives, according to Marx and Engels, is the production of material goods. The specifics of the socio-economic mechanism depends on productive forces and production relations.
Productive forces are tools, labor and means of production (land, manufactories, factories, etc.).
Industrial relations are relations between people that take shape in the production process. The relations of production depend on relations of ownership of the means of production. In other words, some people own the means of production, others do not; and therefore forced to sell their labor first.
Thus, the ownership of the means of production leads to the fact that in society there are two large groups - the exploiters and the exploited.
The exploiters own the means of production, which gives them the opportunity to extract income by appropriating the results of the labor of other people for free (this is exploitation).
Depending on production relations and productive forces, a social structure is built in which two classes always dominate (with the exception of periods of primitiveness in the past and socialism in the future). One of them is the exploiters class. The other is the exploited class. The interests of these classes are opposite, and moreover, irreconcilable. Therefore, antagonistic (absolutely contradictory) relations are formed between classes that lead to social conflicts.
The struggle of classes is the most important factor in social development.
One of the key concepts of Marxism is “formation”. This is a long stage of the historical process, which is characterized by a particular combination of productive forces and production relations. The historical process, K. Marx and F. Engels believed, is a consistent change of formations, generally binding (under normal conditions of development) for all countries and peoples.
In a slave-owning formation: the main means of production is land; labor - slaves; the nature of production relations - non-economic coercion to work based on personal dependence; the main classes are slaves and slaveholders.
under feudalism: the main means of production is land, labor is dependent peasants; the nature of production relations - non-economic coercion to work, based on land dependence; the main classes are peasants and feudal aristocrats.
Under capitalism: the main means of production is the factory, labor is the proletariat, the owners of the means of production are the bourgeois; the nature of production relations - economic coercion to work (voluntary employment); the main classes are the bourgeoisie and the proletariat (workers).
It must be emphasized that feudalism is characterized by non-economic coercion to work, while capitalism is characterized by economic (voluntary hiring of labor). This circumstance makes labor more productive and allows the introduction of new production equipment.
The transition from one formation to another is inevitable, since the historical process has a linearly progressive character. Each new formation is born in the old, when that, under the influence of its own development factors, falls into decay. The main way to move from one formation to another is revolution. It is necessary and possible at the moment when the old formation ceases to be progressive, i.e. create favorable conditions for the development of productive forces. The source of the revolution is the conflict between dynamically developing productive forces and industrial relations lagging behind in development. The transformation of the basis leads to a change in the superstructure - i.e. to a change in the political regime.
K. Marx and F. Engels paid special attention to the analysis of contemporary capitalism.
Under capitalism of free competition, the bourgeois derive income by appropriating the results of the labor of the workers, constantly intensifying their exploitation for the sake of winning the competition. Since the entrepreneur of the era of wild capitalism is not bound by either the state or corporate obligations, he seeks an unlimited increase in his own profit, which makes his interests incompatible with the interests of the proletariat. All this leads to "absolute impoverishment of the proletariat" and, as a result, to the growth of social tension.
Since the essence of capitalism is to increase the income from production (production expands, and its costs, including those for workers' wages, decrease), then, according to K. Marx and F. Engels, the activities of the bourgeoisie objectively and inevitably lead to growth proletariat (number of jobs) and at the same time to its impoverishment. This is the reason for the regular crises of overproduction, because increasing production, capitalism does not satisfy the needs of people (i.e. does not create mass consumption). In other words, a situation arises when the capitalist mode of production itself inhibits the further growth of productive forces.
Sooner or later, this interweaving of social and economic contradictions should lead, in the opinion of K. Marx and F. Engels, to a socialist revolution and a transition to socialism.
The protagonist must become the protagonist of this revolution. A socialist revolution is possible only in a developed capitalist society, which has already exhausted the positive development potential.
The main sign of socialism as a social system is the lack of private ownership of the means of production and, as a consequence, a classless society. Indeed, in the opinion of K. Marx and F. Engels, the main criterion for dividing society into classes is the relationship of ownership of the means of production. Private ownership of the means of production makes possible the exploitation of man by man. The absence of private ownership of the means of production under socialism should also mean the absence of exploitation.
Since superstructure phenomena are secondary to basic ones, the Marxist political concept proceeds from the above ideas about the essence of socio-economic development.
K. Marx and F. Engels associate the creation of the state with the emergence of private ownership of the means of production and the emergence of antagonistic classes. “The state is that form,” wrote the founders of Marxism, “in which individuals belonging to the ruling class exercise their common interests ... The ruling class gives its will a universal expression in the form of state will.” Political and legal relations, therefore, are a reflection of industrial relations. In other words, in a class society, the state arises as an instrument of the domination of the exploiters over the exploited. It serves the realization of the interests of the exploiters and to suppress the exploited. The state is the main instrument for the protection of private property. It, by military and political means, supports the existing economic order, which is inextricably linked with the exploitation and domination of man over man.
So, the state, from the Marxist point of view, is a product of class antagonisms, a product of class society itself.
Marxism closely links the essence of the state with the interests of the ruling class; therefore, under capitalism, the state serves primarily to create the most favorable conditions for the activities of the bourgeoisie. The state is understood as a committee governing the general affairs of the bourgeoisie.
The basis of the capitalist free market economy is freedom of trade, freedom of sale (including freedom of sale of labor, that is, free-paid labor), therefore the domination of the bourgeoisie provides some democratization of the political system. It is not profitable for the bourgeoisie to maintain various kinds of feudal privileges and class restrictions that impede the free flow of labor on the labor market. In other words, under capitalism, exploitation can only be subjected to a personally free person. Indeed, capitalism is based on economic coercion to work - this is the guarantee of the economic efficiency of a capitalist economic organization.
However, K. Marx and F. Engels believe that only the owner possesses genuine freedom in the bourgeois state, since his political freedom has a real, not formal basis. This foundation is economic independence.
Democracy (even if it provides universal suffrage) does not contradict the rule of the bourgeoisie, argue K. Marx and F. Engels. Formal democracy is characterized by the election of representatives of the people, the presence of political rights and freedoms, the separation of powers, equality before the law, etc. - all this does not affect working conditions, property relations, the exploitative nature of capitalism. Therefore, democracy itself does not lead to the elimination of private ownership of the means of production and to the disappearance of human domination over man, for the essence of such domination is economic (basic), and not political.
For the implementation of real democracy, in the opinion of K. Marx and F. Engels, it is necessary the freedoms effective in the political sphere to extend to the economic life of people. In other words, the economic liberation of man is necessary. Therefore, only a socialist society can be truly democratic, where there is no main reason for human domination over man — private ownership of the means of production.
Bourgeois democracy, from the point of view of Marxism, is just a screen for the rule of the bourgeoisie.
Reducing political processes to socio-economic ones and unambiguously linking the political regime to the interests of the ruling class - all these theses cause a lot of critical responses both among contemporaries of K. Marx and F. Engels, and among modern researchers.
The presentation of K. Marx and F. Engels on the socialist political system.The first stage in the creation of socialism is a revolution, an open violent struggle against the bourgeois order. Therefore, K. Marx and F. Engels put forward the thesis about the need for a temporary dictatorship of the proletariat for the transition period. During the revolution, the proletariat needs a strong proletarian state to overthrow the bourgeoisie. The main task of the dictatorship of the proletariat is the struggle against counter-revolution and the socialization of ownership of the means of production (this is impossible without armed confrontation).
When this task is accomplished, when the economic and political prerequisites for starting the construction of socialism are created, the need for the dictatorship of the proletariat will disappear. So, the dictatorship of the proletariat is the dictatorship of the hegemonic class for the sake of transition to a classless society.
The next stage in the development of a socialist state, according to K. Marx and F. Engels, is genuine (i.e., socialist) democracy. The new state will no longer be an instrument of class domination.
Finally, as a result of the World Revolution (which is inevitable, as is the inevitability of the spread of capitalism throughout the globe), the need for a state as an instrument of protection against external enemies will disappear. Marxism is characterized by internationalism, the idea of \u200b\u200binternational unity of classes, the denial of nationalism and statism. So, after the World Revolution, the last function of the state will disappear, and the state itself will disappear as an institution. It will be replaced by some intra-public regulators.
Thus, K. Marx and F. Engels made the first grandiose attempt to study the essence and patterns of the political system in the aggregate of all aspects of the life of human society. Marxism regarded the existing political regimes as a product of the historical process, which made it possible to establish some trends in their development and principles of functioning.
Basis and add-in. - “The basis is the economic structure of society at this stage of its development. The superstructure is the political, legal, religious, artistic, philosophical views of society and the corresponding political, legal and other institutions. ” In Marxist science of society, the question of basis and superstructure is of great importance. A correct understanding of what constitutes the basis of society and what is its superstructure, what is the relationship of the basis and superstructure, what is their relationship with production, with productive forces allows us to reveal the objective regularity of the development of society and overcome subjectivity in the approach to the history of society.
Under the basis of Marxism refers to the totality of production relations of people. Production relations, one or another type of production relations, are characterized by a form of ownership. The state of production relations is dripping, in whose hands are (see) - at the disposal of the whole society or of individuals, groups, classes, using these means of production for the exploitation of other persons, groups, classes. In the preface to the work “Toward a Critique of Political Economy”, Marx pointed out that “the totality of these production relations constitutes the economic structure of society, the real basis on which the legal and political superstructure rises and to which certain forms of social consciousness correspond.” The basis cannot be equated with production, nor can it be torn off from production. Mixing the basis with production may lead to the incorrect conclusion that the superstructure is determined directly by production, while in reality it is determined by it through the economic basis.
The separation of the basis from production leads to idealism, creates a misconception about the independence of production relations from productive forces. Marxism-Leninism teaches that the mode of production is an inextricable unity of the productive forces and relations of production. A basis is not something immutable. Marxism teaches that the basis changes historically, being the economic system of society at this stage of its development. For example, the basis of a socialist society is fundamentally different from the basis of the capitalist system. The basis of socialist society is characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production and the absence of exploitation of man by man. The capitalist basis means the dominance of private capitalist ownership of the means of production and the exploitation of wage labor.
If the basis serves society economically, then the superstructure serves the society with political, legal, aesthetic and other ideas and creates the corresponding political, legal and other institutions for society. One of the features of the add-in is that it is not directly related to production, with productive forces. Productive forces directly determine the basis of society. The superstructure is connected with production only indirectly, through the economy, through the basis. Changes in the level of development of productive forces are reflected by the superstructure not immediately and not directly, but after changes in the basis, through the refraction of changes in production, in changes in the basis. This position of Marxism is of great importance in the fight against all kinds of vulgarizers who derive legal, aesthetic and other ideas directly from production and thereby distort the actual laws of the appearance and development of the superstructure, its role and significance in society.
In his work, I.V. Stalin deeply revealed the relationship between the superstructure and the economic basis. First of all, the add-in is closely dependent on the basis. “If the basis changes and is eliminated, then after it the superstructure is changed and eliminated, if a new basis is born, then the corresponding superstructure is born after it”. The history of society gives many examples of how the superstructure of society was rebuilt in connection with the liquidation of the old economic basis and the emergence of a new basis. It is this natural connection between the superstructure and the basis that makes it possible to understand why different political, legal, aesthetic and other ideas exist in different historical eras. The superstructure does not exist for a relatively short time, it is a product of one era during which this economic basis lives and functions. Depending on the basis, it is liquidated and disappears with the liquidation and disappearance of this basis.
Growing up on a certain economic basis, the superstructure is not, however, as all kinds of vulgarizers think, passive, and the economic basis is by no means the only active force in the development of society. The vulgarisers who denied the active role of the superstructure included the “economists” and the Mensheviks with their preaching of the “theory of spontaneity”, with their denial of the need for the dictatorship of the proletariat to build socialism. The vulgarization idea of \u200b\u200bthe passivity of the superstructure is consciously used by modern right-wing socialists who preach a hostile Marxism theory. the peaceful growth of capitalism into socialism without a revolutionary struggle, without overthrowing the power of the bourgeoisie. Marxism-Leninism smashed these opportunist, counter-revolutionary "theories" aimed at preserving the reactionary order that has outlived its time. Marxism requires taking into account the enormous role of the superstructure - the political system, law, political, philosophical and other ideas - in the development and strengthening of the basis that generated it.
It cannot be otherwise: the add-in for that is created by the basis to help it take shape and strengthen. A superstructure in a class society is of a class nature, it cannot be indifferent to its basis, treat all classes equally, otherwise it will not be a superstructure. By exerting a serious influence on the basis, the superstructure accelerates or, conversely, slows down the development of society. Thus, the imperialist bourgeoisie uses its state to fight the proletarian revolution, delaying the progressive development of society. All the means of the political and ideological influence of the bourgeois state were launched in order to dull the political creation of the masses and make them an instrument of the policy of imperialism.
The political superstructure, therefore, plays an active reactionary role here. The proletariat, having gained political power and using the objective law of the obligatory conformity of production relations to character (see), destroys bourgeois private property, which impedes the development of productive forces, creates the conditions for the transition of small peasant farming to the rails of a collective, socialist economy. Instead of private property, socialist public ownership of the means of production is established. Here we have a vivid example of the active revolutionary role of the political superstructure in the development of society, its economy and productive forces.
Under socialism, the role of the superstructure becomes especially significant. This is explained by the fact that, in contrast to capitalist society, where the development of the economy is based on spontaneous laws, in the Soviet socialist society the national economy is developing according to scientifically developed plans that reflect the objective economic laws of socialism and are in accordance with them. Never before in the history of mankind has the state performed to the same extent the economic-organizational and cultural-educational functions as the Soviet state does. The powerful influencing role of the policies of the Communist Party and the Soviet state on the development of the economic basis is that this policy is based on taking into account the objective economic laws of socialism, is built in accordance with emerging historical needs.
Knowing the laws of social development, the Communist Party anticipates in advance the basic processes of economic development in the future and accordingly outlines a program of state activity, mobilizing the masses to implement this program. Thus, considering the superstructure as depending on the economic basis, Marxism at the same time with all its strength emphasizes the enormous active role of the superstructure in the development of the economic basis. At the present time, when the Soviet people, under the leadership of the Communist Party, carry out the ambitious tasks of a gradual transition from socialism to communism, an important condition for successful advancement is the further strengthening of the Soviet state, the education of the working masses in the spirit of communism, Soviet patriotism, the strengthening of the entire ideological front, the struggle against survivals capitalism in the minds of people.
The Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the basis and superstructure of society is an effective guide in the struggle for the destruction of the capitalist system and the building of communism. If a bourgeois state, bourgeois law actively contribute to maintaining the economic basis of capitalism, the economic system of exploitation and. oppression, then without destroying the power of the bourgeoisie, teaches Marxism-Leninism, it is impossible to destroy the capitalist system, it is impossible to socially liberate the working class and all working people and, therefore, it is impossible to build socialism. Only the socialist revolution, destroying the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat, ensures the transition from capitalism to socialism, creates the conditions for building a socialist and then communist society - such is the conclusion that follows from the Marxist-Leninist principles on the basis and superstructure.
Basis and add-in - The most important concepts of historical materialism: “The basis is the economic structure of society at this stage of its development. A superstructure is the political, legal, religious, artistic, philosophical views of society and the corresponding political, legal and other institutions.
Each basis has its own superstructure corresponding to it. The basis of the feudal system has its own superstructure, its political, legal and other views and the institutions corresponding to them, the capitalist basis has its own superstructure, the socialist has its own. If the basis changes and liquidates, then its superstructure changes and liquidates, if a new basis is born, then the corresponding superstructure is born after it ”(I. Stalin, Marxism and Linguistics, p. 3).
From the point of view of the unscientific, idealistic. understanding of history, the basis of public life are those or other forms of social consciousness, social ideas, moral or religious teachings, political or legal theories, political institutions; economical relations, the social structure of society and all social development as a whole, idealists declare dependent, derived from consciousness, from ideas, politic. theories and institutions. This anti-scientific, idealistic. view of public life, the course of socio-historical development was dealt a crushing blow by Marx and Engels, who created a true, truly scientific, materialistic. understanding of history is historical materialism. This was a great scientific discovery, a radical revolution in the development of theoretical thought. “Just as Darwin discovered the law of the development of the organic world, so Marx discovered the law of the development of human history - the one that until recently was hidden under ideological layers, a simple fact that people should first eat, drink, have a home and dress before being able to engage in politics, science, art, religion, etc .; that, therefore, the production of direct material means of livelihood, and thereby each given stage of the economic development of a people or era, forms the basis from which state institutions, legal views, art, and even religious representations of these people develop and from which they must therefore be explained, - and not vice versa, as was done until now by the ior ”(Engels F., Speech on the grave of Marx, in the book: K. Marx and Engels with F., Elect. production, vol. 2, p. .).
The production of wealth lies at the heart of all social life. The implements of production and the people who bring them into action and possess certain production experience, certain labor skills, constitute the productive forces of society; these productive forces form only one necessary side of production, the mode of production. The other side is production relations between people (see. Productive forces and production relations). Production is always social production. Carrying out the production of material goods, people establish between themselves one or another production relationship - mutual relations within production. The production process can be carried out only within the framework of production relations that make up the economic structure of society, its real basis. Productive forces and production relations form two necessary and inseparable sides of the mode of production, which is the embodiment of their unity in the production of material goods. What is the mode of production in a given society, such are, in the main, the society itself, its ideas, views, ideology, forms, completely. institutions. Social being determines social consciousness. The prevailing mode of production corresponds to certain dominant ideas, theories, forms of consciousness, politic. organization.
With the change in the productive forces of society, the production relations of people also change. With a change in the mode of production, sooner or later the whole social system changes. In the preface to “To a Critique of Political Economy”, K. Marx writes: “At a certain stage of its development, the material productive forces of society conflict with existing production relations, or - which is only a legal expression of this - with property relations, within which they still exist. then developed. From the forms of development of productive forces, these relations turn into their fetters. Then comes the era of social revolution. With a change in the economic basis, a coup d'etat more or less quickly takes place in the entire huge superstructure. When considering such coups, it is always necessary to distinguish a material coup, with scientific accuracy, in the economic conditions of production from legal, political, religious, artistic or philosophical, in short: from ideological forms in which people are aware of this conflict and wage their struggle ”(M and r to with K. c. Engels F., Soch., t. 12, part 1, p. 7).
In a society divided into antagonistic. classes, the struggle of social ideas is based on the class struggle. Since in bourgeois society is capitalist. the mode of production determines the existence of two antagonistic. classes (exploiting - the bourgeoisie and exploited - the proletariat), then in this society there are two opposing ideologies: bourgeois, defending the interests of the ruling class, and hostile to it proletarian, socialist, expressing and reflecting the struggle of the working class for the overthrow of capitalist. oppression and socialist. the reorganization of society in the interests of all workers. Since along with the proletariat and the bourgeoisie in capitalist. society also has intermediate classes - the peasantry, the petty bourgeoisie
cities, besides bourgeois and proletarian ideology, there still exists a half-petty-bourgeois ideology corresponding to the intermediate position of these classes and layers of society.
Having grown on a certain economy, basis, the superstructure has the opposite effect on the economy that generated it, the basis. The nature of the inverse effect of an add-on on a basis is different: it depends on the social nature of the economy, the basis and the add-on. The superstructure can act in the direction of the progressive course of social development and thereby contribute to the further development of the productive forces of society. This is the case in socialist. society. The superstructure can be a brake on the development of productive forces, delay the course of social development. This is the case in modern capitalist. society.
Considering the wonros about the state as a politic. in a letter to Schmidt on October 27, Engels wrote: “The reverse effect of state power on economic development can be of three kinds. She can act in the same direction - then things go faster; it can act against economic development, - then at present it collapses in every large parody after a certain period of time; or it can put obstacles to economic development in certain directions and push forward in other directions. This case reduces, in the end, to one of the previous ones. But it is clear that in the second and third cases, political power can cause the greatest harm to economic development and can generate waste of forces and material in large quantities ”(K. Marx and F. Engelz, Selected Letters, p. -).
The modern bourgeois state in all its forms and varieties - from parliamentary to fascist - is an example of a reactionary political superstructure. Imperialist politics and imperialist wars cause the greatest destruction of the productive forces. The presence of a bourgeois state is the main reason that the rotten capitalist. society, despite all its contradictions, continues to exist. Socialist. the state, on the contrary, is a great revolutionary transforming force that ensures the development of socialism. mode of production and society as a whole. The states of people's democracy also have a powerful progressive effect on the entire course of public life and ensure the construction of socialism.
A huge contribution to the development of the question of the basis and superstructure, of the role of advanced ideas and advanced politic. institutions are the work of V.I. Lenin and I.V. Stalin. Developing further the historical materialism of Marx, V. I. Lenin saw his merit in the fact that he first established the division of social relations “into material and ideological. The latter represent only a superstructure over the former ”(Soch., Vol. 1, p.). In the further development of the Marxist-Leninist theory of basis and superstructure, an outstanding role belongs to the classical works of IV Stalin “On dialectical and historical materialism” and “Marxism and questions of linguistics”. JV Stalin deeply substantiated the scientific conclusion that “public ideas, theories, political institutions, having arisen on the basis of the urgent tasks of developing the material life of society, the development of social life, then inaction themselves on social life, on the material life of society, creating the conditions necessary to bring to the end the resolution of the urgent tasks of the material life of society and to make possible its further development ”(I. Stalin, Questions of Leninism, 11th ed., p.). In contrast to the “economists” and the Mensheviks, who did not recognize the mobilizing, organizing, and transforming role of advanced theory and, falling into vulgar materialism, denied the effective power of superstructures in public life, historical materialism acknowledges and emphasizes the “greatest organizing, mobilizing, and transforming significance of new ideas , new theories, new political views, new political institutions ”(also).
The superstructure, says I. V. Stalin, “is generated by the basis, but this does not mean at all that it only reflects the basis, that it is passive, neutral, indifferent to the fate of its basis, to the fate of classes, to the nature of the system. On the contrary, when it was born, it becomes the greatest active force, actively contributes to its basis to take shape and strengthen, takes all measures to "help the new system finish and eliminate the old basis and the old classes."
It cannot be otherwise. For this, the superstructure is created by the basis, so that it serves him, that it actively helps him to take shape and strengthen, so that she actively fights for the elimination of the old, outdated basis with his old superstructure. One has only to abandon the superstructure from its official role, it is only necessary to move the superstructure from the position of actively defending its basis to the position of indifferent attitude towards it, to the position of the same attitude towards classes, so that it loses its quality and ceases to be an add-on ”(Stalin I., Marxism and questions of linguistics,, p. 7).
The characteristic features of the superstructure, JV Stalin teaches, also consist in the fact that the superstructure “is not directly connected with production, with human production activity. It is connected with production only indirectly, through the economy, through the basis. Therefore, the superstructure reflects changes in the level of development of productive forces not immediately and not directly, but after changes in the basis, through the refraction of changes in production and changes in the basis ”(Tumzhs, p. 8). The superstructure “is a product of one era during which this economic basis lives and functions. Therefore, the superstructure does not live long, it is liquidated and disappears with the liquidation and disappearance of this basis ”(also, p. 6).
In the works of I.V. Stalin, a comprehensive scientific development of the most important problem on the features of the relationship between the base and the superstructure in socialism is given. a society expressing new histor. patterns of development of socialist. society. “Over the past 30 years, and Russia,” IV says (“talin,” the old, capitalist basis was liquidated and a new, socialist basis was built. Accordingly, the superstructure on the capitalist basis was liquidated and a new superstructure was created corresponding to the socialist basis. Consequently, the old political, legal and other institutions were replaced by new, socialist ones ”(also, p. 4).
Savings, the basis of socialist. a society free of class antagonisms is socialist. mode of production. A new superstructure corresponds to it: the Soviet socialist state, Soviet law, socialist ideology. In a socialist setting. society, the relationship of the base and the superstructure is significantly different from their relationship in the exploiting society. In contrast to the bourgeois state, only reinforcing Kain-realistic. the mode of production born in the bowels of feudalism, the Soviet state - the dictatorship of the proletariat - arises before the establishment of the socialist mode of production and is a necessary political condition for its creation. Socialist the mode of production cannot occur spontaneously in the depths of capitalism. It arises under the conditions of the dictatorship of the proletariat and forms its material basis. Moreover, and under socialism, the mode of production plays a decisive role in the development of society. The strength and power of the Soviet state depends on the degree of its economic power. Socialist development. the mode of production is carried out on the basis of the implementation of the policies of the Communist Party, through conscious, planned leadership by the socialist state. The socialist state leads, organizes, directs the whole process of economic life. It has a real opportunity to carry out this function due to the fact that the means of production under socialism constitute public property. The state leadership under socialism belongs to the working class, which is at the same time the most important productive force. Under socialism, the development of society has a conscious and planned character. The politics of the communist party and socialist. State is the lifeblood of Soviet society. The role and significance of the party, state, and all forms of ideology in Soviet society are growing tremendously.
Basis - the totality of production relations existing in society.
Add-in - the totality of certain social ideas, views, theories, the system of ideological relations and the organizations that consolidate them, developing in accordance with them.
The relation of basis and superstructure is the relation of primary-secondary. Ideological relations as spiritual (subjective) have an objective content and material means of realization, or the material part of the superstructure. The latter is “removed” from material production for the realization of spiritual life and, being objective, is a specific component of social life. This objective part of the superstructure is the connecting link of the objectively real and subjectively real existence of society, a means of their mutual influence.
Non-tuning elements - These are various social groups, classes, strata, special family relationships.
Dialectics of the basis and superstructure.
The historically defined economic basis determines the type of social superstructure: the nature of the state and law, moral, philosophical, artistic, religious, etc. views and relationships, as well as their respective institutions.
The coup in the economic system (basis) of a given society causes changes in the entire social superstructure. Each historically defined social superstructure has as its basis a historically defined economic basis, which it cannot outrun. The superstructure is not ahead of the basis as a whole, but the available basis, its realized part, but the underlying development trends not included in the basis. If the legal, political, etc. superstructure is ahead of the existing economic basis, then this means that it expresses, fixes in its normative acts and laws in general the tendency for its further development. Thus, it does not break away from reality, but approaches it, for this prediction is not from consciousness itself, but on a real material basis, on the basis of those elements of the future that are embodied in the present and reflected by consciousness. Being itself, the economic basis, and not consciousness, determine the depth of foresight, limit it to the limit of time and the degree of accuracy.
Non-Marxist concepts of the historical process
The materialistic concept of post-industrial society arose in the 70s of the 20th century. Representatives (Bell, Toffler, Castells, Dzhezinsky).
D. Bell
The selection criterion is the nature of labor.
A) Pre-industrial
Based on extractive industries (agriculture)
B) Industrial
It is determined by factory production and technology for mass production.
Economic activity is of an economic nature. Human interaction with artificial nature begins, i.e. by car.
C) Post-industrial
B) is maintained and developed, but the determining type of economic activity is trade, healthcare, science - the production of services.
The goal is profit, satisfaction of needs. The nature of labor is more complex and cannot be decomposed into simple components. The main thing is the interaction of man with man.
The roots of this form according to Bell lie in the unprecedented influence of science on production.
Marx: “The emergence of the white-collar class”, therefore, there are much more highly skilled workers than working people, and, consequently, the degeneration of value relations.
Marx and Bell both came to the creative nature of work, the main purpose of which is to perfect a person.
V. Inozemtsev
The criterion is the nature of the activities of people and the relationships between them that develop in the production process.
A) pre-economic
B) Economic
C) Post-economic
Formations A) correspond to them. Pre-economic - primary
B) Economic - secondary
C) Post-economic - tertiary
A) Human pre-labor activity, struggle for survival. The purpose of economic activity is survival. Collective interests dominate personal ones.
B) Private ownership of the means of production, the appearance of exploitation, therefore, inequality. The dominance of personal interests over public ones. Feature - the alienated nature of labor and the relationship of man with each other.
C) Occurs, if labor is overcome as an economic necessity, an incentive to develop a new goal to express oneself (human self-development). Creativity is the basis of a post-economic economy. As a result of NTP, free time is released. In addition to this, transport facilitates the development of individuals. There is a need for people who are able to perform complex creative activities.
O. Toffler
The criterion - the type of family determines the economic characteristics.
Waves are the processes of civilization of a society.
A) Pre-industrial (Agrarian) 10,000 years ago
B) Industrial 2 1750 years BC
C) Post-industrial after the Second World War
BUT) Character traits
Earth - the basis of economics, politics, family
There was a division of labor
Natural economy
Operation of renewable energy carriers.
Products are made by hand.
Features of the social sphere
Large families (grandfathers, grandmothers, uncles, aunts, etc.) - a fixed, unified production and economic unit
B) Character traits
Standardization of society
Energy from non-renewable sources
Factories
Market economy
Features of the social sphere
Family - distant relatives are separated from it, the predominance of nuclear families (mom, dad, several children). Parenting and caring for the elderly are transferred to social structures.
Mass education of children for factory life
Corporations
AT) Character traits
Society standardization
Many different energy resources
The development of electronics, astronautics, penetration into the depths of the sea, the biological industry.
Features of the social sphere
Family breakdown (many divorces)
All institutions from the second wave disintegrate
The growing number of different types of families
The increase in the number of single people, childless lifestyle
Advantages and disadvantages of the concept of post-industrial society.
All these concepts are materialistic.
Criterion - the nature of labor in society
Science in all of them is increasingly affecting production.
The main area of \u200b\u200bproduction is the acquisition of new knowledge, therefore, spiritual activity is the mode of existence of a post-industrial society, and therefore idealism.
The concepts of a post-industrial society describe a change in it, and not the reasons for the change.
They separate knowledge from material knowledge, and information is necessary for the development of production.
These concepts lead to a decrease in physical labor, but physical and intellectual labor are not the same thing; therefore, mental labor is not required to grow.
The production of knowledge is pointless without the development of material and technical base.
Equilibrium theory, the name of a number of non-Marxist socio-historical concepts that try to explain the processes of development and functioning of society or its elements on the basis of the principle of equilibrium, borrowed from natural science. These concepts are not theories in the strict sense of the word: the concept of equilibrium is used here precisely as a general explanatory principle.
Attempts to consider society as an equilibrium system first appeared in European social science in the 17th century. under the influence of a rapidly developing mechanistic natural science (B. Spinoza, T. Hobbes, G. Leibniz). Considering social problems from the standpoint of "social physics", "mechanics of passions", thinkers of that era were inclined to reduce the problem of public order to the existence of an equilibrium between parts of society, resembling the equilibrium of the elements of the physical world. Actually R. t. For the first time received a detailed exposition in the 18th century. in Utopian constructions, Sh. Fourier, who based his methods of calculating equilibrium and harmonizing passions based on his plan of ideal human intercourse, and considered the idea of \u200b\u200bbalance universal for the whole universe.
In the 2nd half of the 19th century The idea of \u200b\u200bequilibrium as applied to social problems was developed by sociologists-positivists O. Comte, G. Spencer, A. Small, L. Ward, for whom the equilibrium of physical systems still served as a standard. At the beginning of the 20th century the conceptual foundations of R. t. are somewhat modified under the influence of organismic thinking: the standard of equilibrium is now not the mechanical system, but the living organism, where this equilibrium is ensured by complex internal regulation processes. One of the first to implement this approach was A. A. Bogdanov, who, with his tectology, anticipated some of the principles of cybernetics and the modern systems approach, but at the same time made a number of serious mechanistic miscalculations and simplifications. In the 20s. R. T. found adherents in the person of a number of owls. mechanistic philosophers (D. Sarabyanov, I. I. Skvortsov-Stepanov, etc.), who actually opposed R.'s provisions to the doctrine of dialectical materialism on the unity and struggle of opposites, considering leaps as "processes of imbalance." The r.t. served as the methodological basis of N. I. Bukharin's right-wing ideas, obscuring the contradictions in the development of production relations during the period of building socialism.
Since the late 30s. Some ideas of R. t. receive a new design, and we are not talking about a detailed theoretical scheme, but only about the principle of explanation. The use of this principle was largely stimulated by the principle of homeostasis developed in the framework of physiology and cybernetics and the study of stable conditions in the natural sciences and technology. The dynamic equilibrium model is being adopted by many representatives of structural-functional analysis in bourgeois sociology, in whom the idea of \u200b\u200bequilibrium acquires a conservative ideological subtext. Many bourgeois sociologists criticize the functionalist R. of t., Noting that it deals only with ideal balanced systems, ignores the intrasystem sources of imbalance and therefore is poorly adapted for analyzing the processes of social change. These weaknesses are especially evident in empirically oriented areas of sociology - in industrial sociology, in works on "human relations" in industry, in "management science", specializing in the development of methods of manipulating people to ensure equilibrium in the functioning of bourgeois society.
Marxism-Leninism fundamentally rejects r. T. As a theoretical construction, revealing the conservative-guardian prejudices of its representatives. At the same time, this does not mean discarding the concept of equilibrium and the concept of stability associated with it: these concepts play an important heuristic role in the study of dynamically developing systems, acting as one of the conditional reference points; the only problem is that on the basis of these concepts it is impossible to build a holistic explanation of the processes in the respective systems.
(base / superstructure) Under the "basis" understand the economic basis of society, and under the "superstructure" - social and ideological relations based on the basis. This "topographic" relationship, attributed to Marx, caused great confusion in sociopolitical science, especially when discussing the role of the state under capitalism. The relationship between the "economic basis" (basis, foundation) of society and the corresponding "ideological (political) superstructure", first formulated by Marx and Engels in the first part of "German Ideology", was most clearly defined by Marx. In the famous passage from the preface to the criticism of political economy published in 1859 (part one), he wrote: “In the social production of their lives, people enter into certain, necessary, independent of their will relations - production relations, which correspond to a certain stage of development of their material productive forces.The totality of these production relations makes up the economic structure of society, the real basis on which the legal and political superstructure rises and to which certain forms of social consciousness correspond. The mode of production of material life determines the social, political and spiritual processes of life in general? With a change in the economic basis, a revolution takes place more or less quickly in the whole huge superstructure. " Followers of Marx interpret this ratio in two ways. According to the first and prevailing, the ratio of basis and superstructure characterizes the essence of the materialistic understanding of history. Proponents of this point of view literally understand Marx’s statement that changes in production relations give rise to new forms of politics, law and ideology. In accordance with such a “rigid structural-deterministic” interpretation embodied in Soviet Marxism-Leninism, the economic basis defines a political superstructure, which makes a serious analysis of political life unnecessary. Although Engels subsequently tried to soften this point of view by introducing the concept of “determining factor in the last resort”, structural Marxists (as well as technological determinists) remained in the same position as the primacy of economics in the structure of social formations. According to this model, the state plays a secondary role, its existence is determined by the economic basis; changes in state policy only reflect changes in economic relations. Modern Marxists, recognizing the relationship between the basis and the superstructure, but striving to correct the "reduction" and "monistic" bias in the economic side of the historical process, have developed the concept of the active role of the superstructure. In accordance with the second option, the relationship between the basis and the superstructure is considered as an assumed level of abstraction, suitable for limited analytical purposes. According to this view, which exists among milder and more humane Marxists, including Gramsci, the Frankfurt School and most versions of Western Marxism, a rigid structuralist interpretation of the relation is unacceptable as a theory, and Marx himself is hardly would have accepted it. Therefore, Marxist humanists replace it with a dialectical approach, stating that social production relations are manifested only in the form of economic, legal and political relations. This does not mean that each relationship is mutually and causally determined, but indicates that class antagonism always manifests itself in social, political and cultural forms. Therefore, "economic life" to the same extent depends on "political life" and "law", and vice versa. Adhering to this opinion, determinists show apolitical technicism in understanding "economic life" and do not pay due attention to Marx's emphasis on social production relations. For most Western Marxists, the relationship between basis and superstructure is more a statement of Marx's materialism (as opposed to philosophical idealism) than a guiding attitude in historical research. A distinctive feature of Marx’s methodology is not an imaginary emphasis on an “economic basis”, but in his stubborn desire to consider capitalist society from the perspective of class relations and class struggle.