Understanding Historical Materialism: A Scientific Approach to Society

if we're going to see political power for the working class every advantage we can get we need to take it one of these

advantages we can take is a clear understanding of human society this kind of understanding would give us insight

into how particular groups may respond and behave to given events clarification of competing interests and to understand

the relations between these different groups what we need is to take a scientific approach to human society and

its development we need historical materialism in trying to understand the world around us we've developed the

scientific method it involves careful observation of phenomena developing hypotheses about these observations and

determining whether or not these hypotheses hold up need to be refined or eliminated in light of new data but the

fundamental assumption of all the sciences is that all phenomena biological chemical psychological all

these phenomena have a cause and that these causes exist right here in the material world not often the heavens not

off with god not off in some plane of existence independent of this world but right here this is a materialist outlook

that science takes and most of you would agree this is a correct assumption about our world things don't just happen

because they happen they have a cause and just because we may not know something's caused at the moment doesn't

mean that cause doesn't exist it's important we don't fall into a kind of mechanistic materialism where one thing

is either only a cause or an effect where one phenomena has a single cause and their interaction is a single event

isolated from everything else in reality things are a lot more fluid and full of motion a single phenomena can have a

dizzying amount of causes and it can often be both a cause and an effect we find all things are constantly

interacting with one another and that each thing cannot be properly understood outside of these interactions

this is a kind of dialectical view of our world for those who are interested we'll have a separate video exploring

dialectical materialism so in taking a scientific approach to human society we have to make the same assumption all

social phenomena have a cause from the structures of our governments our cultural attitudes our wars our ideas

and so on all have causes in studying these causes we have to recognize that in the science of human society we lack

the sophisticated tools of experimentation available to the quote hard sciences and this is really at the

heart of the seeming divide between the hard sciences and soft sciences for the soft sciences more aptly called the

social sciences we just don't have the precise tools to carry out carefully controlled experiments but if and when

we do develop these tools this seeming divide will dissolve for instance you can imagine running powerful calibrated

simulations of human society where it would be possible to hold constants change variables and record resulting

effects so without these sophisticated tools for the moment the science of human society really can't make the same

kind of pinpoint accurate predictions that the fields of modern physics and chemistry can we're limited by the tools

we have and for the moment what we have is careful observation a powerful tool in the sciences just looking at human

society it can be overwhelming but in making the scientific assumption about human society the question we need to

start with is on what basis does human society exist in the first place humans as living beings need food shelter water

and so on to live and if a society is unable to produce these necessary products there is no society to speak of

what you find is that production is the basis of human society's existence a metabolic relationship between society

and her environment how a society goes about production is what we call its mode of production the instruments and

natural resources used to constitute the means of production together with labor give us the forces of production the

forces of production on their own can't give us a full characterization of a society's mode of production without

understanding how people relate to one another in the course of production we need to understand the relations of

production as well looking at the history of human societies we see a number of productive modes that have

existed one of the earliest being hunter-gatherer societies these societies utilize spears arrows and

woven baskets to forage for their subsistence the means of production in these societies were owned collectively

and everyone had to involve themselves in the process of production to produce the minimum needed to sustain their

existence in these hunter-gatherer societies we find an incredibly egalitarian social structure in ethos

not because these humans were somehow morally superior or rationally superior to other humans but because their crude

forces of production demanded this egalitarianism these are not productive tools members of this society cannot

afford to leave others to go hungry or uncared for to restrict access to these tools

all hands on deck are needed to muster together just the bare minimum it is in the hunter-gatherers material interest

that they themselves practice this egalitarianism pressure others to behave accordingly and to shun all and any

anti-egalitarian behavior this material interest for egalitarianism is reflected in this society's sense of morality

their ideas about themselves and the world around them the ways in which they govern themselves and so on what's being

highlighted here is that how societies go about production ultimately determines said society's ideas social

structures cultures and so on humanity's physical and mental constitutions along with their environments have remained

constant throughout these diverse societies in relation to the variable element their mode of production a

change in the mode of production forces a change in the social phenomena of society of course we can't be

mechanistic in our thinking these resultant social phenomena go on to influence reinforce and shape production

in a constant feedback loop but in the final analysis the cause of social phenomena is material this is the

materialist assertion in the science of human society a general tendency for the forces of production to develop over

time is an observable phenomena within human societies as an aside this may be rooted in a human interest to expend a

minimum and produce a maximum to make whatever work we're performing easier these improvements on the instruments of

production accumulation of knowledge and refinement of skill increases a society's output as the forces of

production develop in the hunter-gatherer society the output begins to consistently sit above the

minimum product needed to sustain the society for the first time we have a surplus product and the expansion of

wants and needs this surplus allows particular individuals to specialize in sectors of production we have the

emergence of a division of labor the existence of artisans scholars artists warrior casts chiefs feudal lords and so

on are made possible by this surplus product with the division of labor we have a society in which different groups

of individuals now relate to the means of production differently and so too we see a difference in material interests

we have the emergence of a class society in our hunter-gatherer society everyone's relation to the means of

production were equal and thus so too were their material interests everyone had an interest in successful hunts and

forages minimal wear on tools good health for all and so on in a class society where people's relation to the

means of production differ say a society in which the land and tools are privately owned by a lord and doled out

to farmers in exchange for a portion of the product produced we have different and conflicting material interests

between the classes the lord wants to take as much of the yield as possible whereas the farmers want to keep as much

of the yield as possible these are irreconcilable material interests in which there is no resolution under the

given mode of production politics in the class society reflects the class conflict with members of each class

seeking to advance their material interests this deep and irreconcilable conflict within society necessitates a

specialized armed body to hold this society together the state emerges as a product of class society wielded by one

class against another this ruling class whose basis of existence is the appropriation of the surplus product has

a material interest in maintaining the dominant set of social relations and hence uses the state to enforce this

social order as changes occur in the forces of production given classes may emerge and develop while others may

stagnate and decay a rising class can emerge from the developing forces of production which begins to envision a

new set of social relations in line with their material interests struggling against a stagnant class whose material

interest is tied to the current social order a struggle for political supremacy ensues over the power to alter and

enforce a society's social relations the french revolution of 1789 brought the rising french capitals class birth from

the development of trade and commerce to political power with this political supremacy rested

from a stagnant aristocracy the capitals class did away with the dominant feudal relations of society which had been

restricting the developing forces of production and began the construction of capitalist relations of production in

our modern age capitalism is the dominant mode of production as opposed to having individual artisans complete

goods from start to finish production under capitalism is socialized allowing products to be produced with extreme

efficiency although these workers are the ones who produce the products ownership and

control remains private with production being carried out for the private profit of these owners on the market in this

society we see a conflict between the developed forces of production and the now limiting capitalist relations of

production the highly productive forces continually revolutionized undermine profit rates in the long term and

periodically throw the market into crisis in reaction owners seek to maintain profit rates through means such

as the monopolization of markets and innovative technologies holding back the full productivity of the forces of

production this conflict in the mode of production is reflected in the class conflict between the working class and

the capitalist class members of the working class who constitute the overwhelming majority of

society do not own the means of production their only means of subsistence is selling their labor power

in exchange for a wage capitalists privately own the means of production and hire others to work on

these means to produce a product for a market to be sold workers seek to keep as much of the value they generate and

seeking higher wages whereas capitalists seek to take as much of the value generated and seeking to lower wages

here we have an irreconcilable conflict of material interests with no resolution under capitalism as the forces of

production continue to develop socializing all that was previously produced by the skilled individual and

dispossessing all those capitalists unable to compete the ranks of the working class expands this rising class

begins to envision new relations of production in line with their material interests it is in the working class's

material interest that this relationship of exploitation between the worker and owner is abolished altogether such that

the surplus generated by the working class is kept by the working class private ownership over the means of

production is to be abolished and replaced by public ownership and control letting loose the full productive power

of the forces of production in this society everyone's relation to the means of production is equal and we thus no

longer have antagonistic economic groups that can only improve their condition by ruining the other by working hard in

this society the individual not only raises the standard of living for themselves but all those around them and

vice versa as the freed forces of production accelerate in their development society may enter a fully

socialized economy in which production is carried out according to need and want as opposed to private profit in

conjunction with this expanding working class under capitalism the ranks of the capitals class shrink as ownership over

the means of production ever concentrate in fewer hands every socially necessary function once performed by the

capitalist is continually devolved to the working class such that the developed modern capitalist exists with

no real social function beyond that of a passive recipient of the surplus product produced by the workers the capitalist

class once playing a revolutionary role has become a useless and parasitic class whose material interest is to defend the

current social relations of society at all costs in perpetuity this defense is carried out by the dictatorship of

capital in which ultimate political authority lies among those with wealth and capital to achieve their aims the

workers must abolish this dictatorship of capital and establish a political system in which legislation of the law

execution of the law defense of the law and judgment of the law are all under majority rule they must establish the

dictatorship of the proletariat a true and full application of democratic rule to all spheres of public life with this

political supremacy the working classes may abolish the capitalist relations of production and begin the construction of

a socialist economy keep in mind what we've been discussing thus far are general trends as we've discussed

earlier all sciences are limited by the available tools and for the science of human society we just don't have the

tools to make pinpoint accurate day-to-day predictions taking a look at the current snapshot of capitalist

society you don't see a neat divide between the workers and capitalists that's been described we see workers who

have investments in the stock market working class families who own their own homes we see highly skilled workers who

may leverage this skill to secure a comfortable living standard you also still see small business owners who

aren't big enough to hire enough employees to carry out all the functions of a business they have to work

themselves and in many parts of the world you still see the existence of a peasant class but the general laws of

capitalist development continuously divide society into these two grand classes hey it's been a minute thank you

all for your patience and and wow there are a lot of you if you want to learn more about historical materialism i've

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