Historical materialism

ideas of Karl Marx. His mother belonged to a Marxist organization when he was a child and he continued to discuss Marx’s ideas with the Mundial Upheaval Society at Columbia (Smith). In Sweetness and Power, Mintz touches on Marx’s ideas of historical materialism and the separation of production and consumption within that system. Mintz’s object of study is sugar as a commodity and a means of subsistence (Mintz 1985: 6). His approach leaves room for culture at work in the societies as another way…

Materialism is the theory of understanding society and individual approach. In Frederick Engels paper, the capitalistic structure is explained, how it was created, how it influences society and what conflicts it brought. My paper is first going to talk about the historical materialism and establish what Engels meant by that. Afterword, this paper going to discus about the fundamental contradiction in capitalism. Furthermore, I am going to expend on that concept by applying it on two different…

histories, historical materialism, and our belief that progress is good. In short, Nietzsche…

societies, one needs to approach them with a historical or dialectical materialist standpoint. Two Marxist thinkers who contemplate over how to properly practice analyzing societies are Mao and Althusser. In this paper I m going to show how both Mao and Althusser approached using social science in order to better analyze societies. I am also going to contrasts the two theories and discover which theory maintained more connectedness to Marx’s dialectical materialism. I conclude that although both…

economic system. Within his description of capitalism, he defines the term historical materialism and its relations to defining social structure. In addition, Engels explains the fundamental contradiction in capitalism and the contradictions that arise from it. Furthermore, Engels explains what he envisions to be the ultimate outcome of the historical development of capitalism. According to Engels, the term historical materialism is stated to have started “from the principle that production,…

In the excerpt from Anti-Duhring, called Theoretical, through his historical materialism approach, Friedrich Engles explains that the capitalist mode of production has a fundamental contradiction and by using examples of social and economic struggles, he further validates his position for the basis of the contradiction. By examining these social and economical examples, Engles attempts to demonstrate that over time, capitalism will fail and socialism is the favorable choice. In his article,…

Marx’s study on historical materialism focuses on the division of labor, which is created by the concept of production. This concept entails how the tools an individual has determines which activities he or she will engage in. Marx argues that the different activities that are…

DIALECTICS OF ECONOMICAL BASE AND SOCIO-CULTURAL SUPERSTRUCTURE - A MARXIST PERSPECTIVE Abstract: In Marxist theory, social structure consists of two parts - Base and Superstructure. This base and superstructure designate the social relations of a historically determined society as a whole in which material relations represent the real base or the foundation of society where as political, religious, philosophical and ideological relations etc. represent the superstructure, which rise upon the…

Philosophers have given various propositions as to how society as a whole has changed throughout the course of time. Engels first lays out the fundamental warfare between socialism and capitalism and then explains what he calls “Material conception of history” (Engels 1939, p. 292). In his materialistic history, he claims that the trade of products and their production is the basis of every social order (Engels 1939, p 292). Engels states that in every society that has permanently appeared of…

In the article "Theoretical" from Anti-Dühring Fredrick Engels talks about capitalism, historical materialism as well as the contradictions that occur. Capitalism by definition means private ownership of products that are invested in, produced and profit from are decided by the owner of the products which is settled on depending on the competition of other private sellers of goods. The impact that production has already had on the society and how it effects things economically more than it is…