7 relations in social change 7 relations in the totality of society - historical materialism is a study of society 7:00 1. Technology 2. Relation to nature 3. Labour process of production 4. Reproduction of labour power 5. Mental conceptions of the world 6. Structure of state 7. Social relations Systems are becoming and elements are constantly changing Social theories tend to think one of the 7 elements is the predominant force. A system view is that these elements co-exist and co-evolve. They don’t have linear or simple causalities. You could say one element has the most pronounced change and start to pull other elements to change at different junctures.
According to our experience, in order to build socialism we must first of all develop the productive forces, which is our main task. This is the only way to demonstrate the superiority of socialism. Whether the socialist economic policies we are pursuing are correct or not depends, in the final analysis, on whether the productive forces develop and people’s incomes increase. This is the most important criterion. We cannot build socialism with just empty talk. The people will not believe it.
@@JohnSmith-mc2zz you are not understanding material conditions and how they shape the world, this is all liberal individualism to say that a socialist society can build to communism but it is just capitalism, that Marx anticipated collapse and it did in Russia in 1917. Marx was an astute observer but his observations end with his death.
@@JohnSmith-mc2zz "In the social production of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispensable and independent of their will, relations of production which correspond to a definite stage of development of their material productive forces. The sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political and intellectual life process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come in conflict with the existing relations of production, or - what is but a legal expression for the same thing - with the property relations within which they have been at work hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an epoch of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed. In considering such transformations a distinction should always be made between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, aesthetic or philosophic - in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out. Just as our opinion of an individual is not based on what he thinks of himself, so can we not judge of such a period of transformation by its own consciousness; on the contrary this consciousness must be explained rather from the contradictions of material life, from the existing conflict between the social productive forces and the relations of production. No social order ever perishes before all the productive forces for which there is room in it have developed; and new, higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society itself. Therefore mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since looking at the matter more closely, it will always be found that the task itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation." (Marx, Selected Works, Vol. I, pp. 269-70.)
Revolution means carrying out class struggle, but it does not merely mean that. The development of the productive forces is also a kind of revolution - a very important one. It is the most fundamental revolution from the viewpoint of historical development.
What do you mean specifically when you speak of "the development of the productive forces?" Because it sounds like you're simply describing capitalist development, which is already taken as a given when examining industrial/post industrial societies through a Marxist lens.
@@BriarLeaf00 Development of socialist productive forces, which I assume he means socialist means of ownership, ie, collective ownership. That is workers have to start owning their means of production to challenge the dominant capitalist system. And this is quite possible with co operatives and collective investment of profit, which can be done by co ops and if possible, by councils. And then once we have enough proletarian consciousness and have overshadowed the capitalist means, we can dismantle the structure. This process would likely involve counter revolution from the right, at which point the workers can fight them and take state power. Or maybe we can just have a few strong representative parties to represent us in the parliament, well enough for us to destroy the capitalist system from below.
Great discussion on Marx. Many arguments throughout the years. I am a veracious reader of many things, of World Histories, philosophy, theology. Why did socialism receive such a bad name throughout these many years? Which novel does one prefer H.G. Orwell , "1984?" Or Aldoux Huxley's, " Brave New World?' Although I admired both, I go with "Brave New World". I guess I will stay an iconoclast as I grow and learn more. One always may change one's mind. Wisdom .
Maybe socialism received the bad rap it has from the actual results we have seen when socialists take control of a country. The theories always sound great. Too bad the theory never matches the reality.
Thank you for correcting me on the name. I sometimes think to quickly and don't see that I put in wrong word. I hate typing on these cell phones. I do like Orwells both novels, although I still go with Aldoux Huxley's "Brave New World" if one has to pick one over the other.
That's excellent! "As simple as possible but not simpler". You know an example of 'simpler' we've heard a lot during the pandemic? "The virus wants to" do something. Viruses don't have will, though.
Over the past 30 years since the founding of the People’s Republic, we have laid the basic socialist foundation in agriculture, industry, and other areas. But we have a major problem, that is, we have wasted some time and our productive forces have developed too slowly. All revolution is designed to remove obstacles to the development of the productive forces. Since socialism is superior to capitalism, socialist countries should be able to develop their economies more rapidly than capitalist countries, improving their people’s living standards gradually and becoming more powerful. We have suffered some setbacks in this respect.
But also until now it shows how Marx is still very very much dangerous to the system of capitalism and also to any system. His analysis is THE analysis because of the depth and the global way of thinking about how the world is connected and complex and shouldn't be thinking of as one thing without the other things or elements. I think through Mr Harvey's much-needed and well beyond expectations to Marx way of thinking has had given me, indeed, much-needed an intellectual background to be able to see and criticize the world and the system I deal with. And with that for someone who leaves in the west and especially in the USA can recognize every day what Mr Harvey is talking about through the lenses of Marx. Just going to downtown ever morning I can see that the great chaplain and his 5 or 6 minutes of his masterpiece modern times movie has understood what Marx was talking about and his criticism to this kind of system and also how chaplain was extremely sensitive to the working class conditions through Marx lenses to a higher degree ans especially how he explained Marx's idea about time and its relationships to profit again through his eternal movie Modern times.
People in cold environments had to struggle more in order to survive, than those in hot climates. Therefore they were better motivated to develop technology, which impacted culture.
Deng Xiaoping To Build Socialism We Must First Develop the Productive Forces Published: Translated by: Unknown Source: Deng Xiaoping Works Transcription for MIA: Joonas Laine
In marxist view history itself is a revolution, from the primitive man governed by the dictates to battle the elements, to the pressing need to establish some form of organization and order in the most primitive way. As tribes begin to evolve in some form of governance from everything around is owned in common that characterized primitive societies, to later human development that developed the concept of property based on the numbers of nature of things the owners hold or one had, maybe because of superior strength, or had the most cunning way to sway others who can imposed their will over others. In empires it's the king's, queens or emperor wields the power over the fiefdom. Marx believes that history is a never-ending class struggle, and those who posses power hold the means of production by the advent of the industrial revolution.
The first agricultural revolution had to of led to a theft of the overall tribal surplus which began the pattern of using people's labor to take from their surplus labor, this probably happened before slavery since a more complex hierarchical organization was probably required to even normalize slavery, and such a more complex hierarchy (beyond something like chiefs and elders etc) would require exploiting people away from the free tribal sharing of the surplus. The dynamic of theft of surplus is the structure of all more complex power structures and hierarchical non tribal dominant modes of production. The taking of the tribes communal surplus (a thief from within) must of led to the taking of the individuals surplus (non slavery labor hierarchy, slavery etc). And keep in mind Marx was essentially tracking what led to capitalism so it's the line of modes of production from Europe to Rome and back to Mesopotamia and the fertile crescent. Marx said in letters to Vasulich about the Russian Mir system, that the modes don't go in that order everywhere. He seemingly saw Capitalism as a final stage before the entire format that began in the first agricultural revolution crashes and humanity repeats communal living but not "primitive communism", a modern new level of that ancient dynamic.
There are definitely a lot of vulgar materialists out there that practice what they call „dialectic materialism“ by stating that „there’s nothing but the material world, this is what scientists believe, therefore, our Marxist analysis is very scientific too. And if we don’t like something, we call it idealism.“ I‘m REALLY glad that you’re not one of those people.
What? That is not "vulgar materialism" in this sense, that is called "philosophical materialism" (aka physicalism) and it's objectively true and Marx was certainly a philosophical materialist. Vulgar materialism in the sense of historical materialism means breaking the historically material development to basic generalized stages (primitive communism, agricultural, slavery, feudalism, capitalism) without understanding that that is not a totality in time and space and that it is more complicated than just that. Although vulgar materialism can be used as a basic gist (hence using the term "vulgar". It absolutely in no way is meant to be against philosophical materialism, the analysis that ALL reality is matter and that there is nothing outside matter. "Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions of material things. According to philosophical materialism, mind and consciousness are by-products or epiphenomena of material processes (such as the biochemistry of the human brain and nervous system), without which they cannot exist. Materialism directly contrasts with idealism, according to which consciousness is the fundamental substance of nature. Materialism is closely related to physicalism-the view that all that exists is ultimately physical. Philosophical physicalism has evolved from materialism with the theories of the physical sciences to incorporate more sophisticated notions of physicality than mere ordinary matter (e.g. spacetime, physical energies and forces, and dark matter). Thus, some prefer the term physicalism to materialism, while others use the terms as if they were synonymous." But dialectical materialism and philosophical materialism are related but not the same thing and I've never heard anyone say that.
@@MortVaanderwaal Have you re-read PLATO/ PHILO/ ORIGEN/ BOETHIUS/ THOMAS/ CALVIN/ BACON/ SPINOZA/ LEIBNIZ/ HERDER/ SCHELLING/ HEGEL/ SPENGLER/ BERGSON? PROBABLY NOT, BECAUSE THEN YOU WOULD UNDERSTAND THAT MARXISM WAS THE DANGEROUS AND STUPID CONSPIRACY THEORY OF THE 19TH CENTURY...... SOCIO-CAPITALISM IS GOOD, LIBERALISM AND MARXISM ARE EVIL.
7 relations in social change
7 relations in the totality of society - historical materialism is a study of society
7:00
1. Technology
2. Relation to nature
3. Labour process of production
4. Reproduction of labour power
5. Mental conceptions of the world
6. Structure of state
7. Social relations
Systems are becoming and elements are constantly changing
Social theories tend to think one of the 7 elements is the predominant force. A system view is that these elements co-exist and co-evolve. They don’t have linear or simple causalities. You could say one element has the most pronounced change and start to pull other elements to change at different junctures.
Thank you for these videos but mainly the podcast. It keeps this worker sane in a complicated world. Thank you Prof. Harvey!
I could listen to prof Harvey talk about Marxism forever, so clear and also soothing
According to our experience, in order to build socialism we must first of all develop the productive forces, which is our main task. This is the only way to demonstrate the superiority of socialism. Whether the socialist economic policies we are pursuing are correct or not depends, in the final analysis, on whether the productive forces develop and people’s incomes increase. This is the most important criterion. We cannot build socialism with just empty talk. The people will not believe it.
@@JohnSmith-mc2zz you are not understanding material conditions and how they shape the world, this is all liberal individualism to say that a socialist society can build to communism but it is just capitalism, that Marx anticipated collapse and it did in Russia in 1917. Marx was an astute observer but his observations end with his death.
@@JohnSmith-mc2zz "In the social production of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispensable and independent of their will, relations of production which correspond to a definite stage of development of their material productive forces. The sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political and intellectual life process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of their development, the material productive forces of society come in conflict with the existing relations of production, or - what is but a legal expression for the same thing - with the property relations within which they have been at work hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an epoch of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed. In considering such transformations a distinction should always be made between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, aesthetic or philosophic - in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out. Just as our opinion of an individual is not based on what he thinks of himself, so can we not judge of such a period of transformation by its own consciousness; on the contrary this consciousness must be explained rather from the contradictions of material life, from the existing conflict between the social productive forces and the relations of production. No social order ever perishes before all the productive forces for which there is room in it have developed; and new, higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society itself. Therefore mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since looking at the matter more closely, it will always be found that the task itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation." (Marx, Selected Works, Vol. I, pp. 269-70.)
@@JohnSmith-mc2zz china is on the path to socialism in 30 years and then communism, to deny this is reactionary.
Revolution means carrying out class struggle, but it does not merely mean that. The development of the productive forces is also a kind of revolution - a very important one. It is the most fundamental revolution from the viewpoint of historical development.
What do you mean specifically when you speak of "the development of the productive forces?" Because it sounds like you're simply describing capitalist development, which is already taken as a given when examining industrial/post industrial societies through a Marxist lens.
@@BriarLeaf00 Development of socialist productive forces, which I assume he means socialist means of ownership, ie, collective ownership. That is workers have to start owning their means of production to challenge the dominant capitalist system. And this is quite possible with co operatives and collective investment of profit, which can be done by co ops and if possible, by councils. And then once we have enough proletarian consciousness and have overshadowed the capitalist means, we can dismantle the structure. This process would likely involve counter revolution from the right, at which point the workers can fight them and take state power. Or maybe we can just have a few strong representative parties to represent us in the parliament, well enough for us to destroy the capitalist system from below.
Great discussion on Marx. Many arguments throughout the years. I am a veracious reader of many things, of World Histories, philosophy, theology. Why did socialism receive such a bad name throughout these many years? Which novel does one prefer H.G. Orwell
, "1984?" Or Aldoux Huxley's, " Brave New World?' Although I admired both, I go with "Brave New World". I guess I will stay an iconoclast as I grow and learn more. One always may change one's mind. Wisdom .
Socialism received a bad name in capitalist countries, because it challenges the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.
Maybe socialism received the bad rap it has from the actual results we have seen when socialists take control of a country. The theories always sound great.
Too bad the theory never matches the reality.
Thank you for correcting me on the name. I sometimes think to quickly and don't see that I put in wrong word. I hate typing on these cell phones. I do like Orwells both novels, although I still go with Aldoux Huxley's "Brave New World" if one has to pick one over the other.
That's excellent! "As simple as possible but not simpler". You know an example of 'simpler' we've heard a lot during the pandemic? "The virus wants to" do something. Viruses don't have will, though.
Over the past 30 years since the founding of the People’s Republic, we have laid the basic socialist foundation in agriculture, industry, and other areas. But we have a major problem, that is, we have wasted some time and our productive forces have developed too slowly. All revolution is designed to remove obstacles to the development of the productive forces.
Since socialism is superior to capitalism, socialist countries should be able to develop their economies more rapidly than capitalist countries, improving their people’s living standards gradually and becoming more powerful. We have suffered some setbacks in this respect.
Thanks Prof Harvey. Marx was right!
this is gold. true dialectics.
Well, nothing called "positive" is going to work now 😋 Thank you Dr. Harvey.
Excellent podcast,helpful for a layman like me.
On a much more serious note...I never really took him to be a southwestern motif interior design type of guy.
😂 I dig it
But also until now it shows how Marx is still very very much dangerous to the system of capitalism and also to any system. His analysis is THE analysis because of the depth and the global way of thinking about how the world is connected and complex and shouldn't be thinking of as one thing without the other things or elements. I think through Mr Harvey's much-needed and well beyond expectations to Marx way of thinking has had given me, indeed, much-needed an intellectual background to be able to see and criticize the world and the system I deal with. And with that for someone who leaves in the west and especially in the USA can recognize every day what Mr Harvey is talking about through the lenses of Marx. Just going to downtown ever morning I can see that the great chaplain and his 5 or 6 minutes of his masterpiece modern times movie has understood what Marx was talking about and his criticism to this kind of system and also how chaplain was extremely sensitive to the working class conditions through Marx lenses to a higher degree ans especially how he explained Marx's idea about time and its relationships to profit again through his eternal movie Modern times.
People in cold environments had to struggle more in order to survive, than those in hot climates. Therefore they were better motivated to develop technology, which impacted culture.
Brilliantly simple! Not simplistic at all. Thanks Prof Harvey.
Small correction: E=mc2 was “invented” by Poincaré, not Einstein :) but overall - great episode !
Deng Xiaoping
To Build Socialism We Must First Develop the Productive Forces
Published:
Translated by: Unknown
Source: Deng Xiaoping Works
Transcription for MIA: Joonas Laine
0:40 that's actually not the entire equation
Yes, it's E=m c^2 dot t with dot t denoting the derivative of coordinate time with respect to the proper time along the curve.
But it does not really matter. The real genius move was the development of the general theory of relativity and the Einstein field equation.
@@sirmclovin9184 You left out momentum.
Karl must be sitting next to Allah.
In marxist view history itself is a revolution, from the primitive man governed by the dictates to battle the elements, to the pressing need to establish some form of organization and order in the most primitive way. As tribes begin to evolve in some form of governance from everything around is owned in common that characterized primitive societies, to later human development that developed the concept of property based on the numbers of nature of things the owners hold or one had, maybe because of superior strength, or had the most cunning way to sway others who can imposed their will over others. In empires it's the king's, queens or emperor wields the power over the fiefdom. Marx believes that history is a never-ending class struggle, and those who posses power hold the means of production by the advent of the industrial revolution.
He did actually believe it would end
The first agricultural revolution had to of led to a theft of the overall tribal surplus which began the pattern of using people's labor to take from their surplus labor, this probably happened before slavery since a more complex hierarchical organization was probably required to even normalize slavery, and such a more complex hierarchy (beyond something like chiefs and elders etc) would require exploiting people away from the free tribal sharing of the surplus. The dynamic of theft of surplus is the structure of all more complex power structures and hierarchical non tribal dominant modes of production. The taking of the tribes communal surplus (a thief from within) must of led to the taking of the individuals surplus (non slavery labor hierarchy, slavery etc). And keep in mind Marx was essentially tracking what led to capitalism so it's the line of modes of production from Europe to Rome and back to Mesopotamia and the fertile crescent. Marx said in letters to Vasulich about the Russian Mir system, that the modes don't go in that order everywhere. He seemingly saw Capitalism as a final stage before the entire format that began in the first agricultural revolution crashes and humanity repeats communal living but not "primitive communism", a modern new level of that ancient dynamic.
♥️
Lmao there are actually people who think you can interpret Marx without dialectics?
Did they petition or wave signs at F Darth Vader? NO. Grow up.
There are definitely a lot of vulgar materialists out there that practice what they call „dialectic materialism“ by stating that „there’s nothing but the material world, this is what scientists believe, therefore, our Marxist analysis is very scientific too. And if we don’t like something, we call it idealism.“
I‘m REALLY glad that you’re not one of those people.
Like who?
What? That is not "vulgar materialism" in this sense, that is called "philosophical materialism" (aka physicalism) and it's objectively true and Marx was certainly a philosophical materialist. Vulgar materialism in the sense of historical materialism means breaking the historically material development to basic generalized stages (primitive communism, agricultural, slavery, feudalism, capitalism) without understanding that that is not a totality in time and space and that it is more complicated than just that. Although vulgar materialism can be used as a basic gist (hence using the term "vulgar".
It absolutely in no way is meant to be against philosophical materialism, the analysis that ALL reality is matter and that there is nothing outside matter.
"Materialism is a form of philosophical monism which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions of material things. According to philosophical materialism, mind and consciousness are by-products or epiphenomena of material processes (such as the biochemistry of the human brain and nervous system), without which they cannot exist. Materialism directly contrasts with idealism, according to which consciousness is the fundamental substance of nature.
Materialism is closely related to physicalism-the view that all that exists is ultimately physical. Philosophical physicalism has evolved from materialism with the theories of the physical sciences to incorporate more sophisticated notions of physicality than mere ordinary matter (e.g. spacetime, physical energies and forces, and dark matter). Thus, some prefer the term physicalism to materialism, while others use the terms as if they were synonymous."
But dialectical materialism and philosophical materialism are related but not the same thing and I've never heard anyone say that.
@@whatabouttheearth try to formulate the laws of physics without math ;)
HISTORY IS A DIALECTICAL AND ESCHATOLOGICAL ARTWORK BY GOD. HISTORICAL MATERIALISM IS NEGATIVE SUPERSTITION.
Source - trust me bro
@@MortVaanderwaal Have you re-read PLATO/ PHILO/ ORIGEN/ BOETHIUS/ THOMAS/ CALVIN/ BACON/ SPINOZA/ LEIBNIZ/ HERDER/ SCHELLING/ HEGEL/ SPENGLER/ BERGSON? PROBABLY NOT, BECAUSE THEN YOU WOULD UNDERSTAND THAT MARXISM WAS THE DANGEROUS AND STUPID CONSPIRACY THEORY OF THE 19TH CENTURY...... SOCIO-CAPITALISM IS GOOD, LIBERALISM AND MARXISM ARE EVIL.
Define historical materialism
Define philosophical materialism (aka physicalism)
@@whatabouttheearth Historical materialism is the idea that history is determined by materialist forces.
it is the capital that dominates society not the capitalist class.. my got.. thought Harvey knew that
Capital only actualizes its domination via the capitalist class’s physical actions. My god I thought that was obvious
A distinction without a difference.