Historical Materialism and the State

Abstract

The article argues that the state is a part of the relations of production-part of the economic base-rather than a superstructural consequence of it. The state therefore does not 'correspond' to the relations of production, as it should do if it were part of the superstructure. Instead, it is a production relation in its own right and, if strong enough, can give rise to a particular kind of superstructure. Military competition compels states to release the potential development of the productive forces. Were they not to do so, they would become a fetter on the further development of the forces of production. The state, in order to defend itself against other states, provides or encourages an economic structure which is beneficial to the development of the productive forces-since, in so doing, it creates the wherewithal for its own survival. This analytical framework can explain why, in the course of the bourgeois revolution, the state has not (up to this point) been reduced to an 'executive committee' of the bourgeoisie-and why in fact for much of that period in much of the world the state has managed to dominate social development.