p The superstructure is brought into being by the basis and is inseparably bound up with it. The superstructure depends on the basis. Let us take, for example, the basis of primitive society. The absence of private property and classes, and consequently of class contradictions, was the reason why the superstructure of primitive society had neither state, political and legal ideas, nor the corresponding institutions.

p The birth of private property and classes, i. e., the appearance of the basis of slave-owning society, brought into being a superstructure of a different kind. Ideas were conceived which justified the rule of the slave-owner over the slave and also institutions (the state and others) protecting this rule.

p The basis of an antagonistic class society has its contradictions. By expressing the different relationships of people to the means of production, it reflects the antithesis of class interests, the antagonism between the oppressed and the oppressors. The economic basis of modern capitalism, for 203 example, is marked above all by antagonism between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, although the economic structure of bourgeois society must not be confined only to the relationship between these two main antagonistic classes. In addition to the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, capitalist society has other classes and social groups—the working peasants, artisans and the petty bourgeoisie in both town and country, whose interests clash with those of the monopoly bourgeoisie.

p Since it is a reflection of the contradictions in the basis, the superstructure of an antagonistic class society also contains contradictions. It includes the ideas and institutions of different classes and social groups, but the ideas and institutions of the class which dominates economically prevail. “...The class, which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force,”  [203•*  wrote Marx and Engels. Under capitalism the bourgeoisie dominates economically so that bourgeois ideas and institutions prevail and are used by the bourgeoisie to fight the working class and to perpetuate its own rule.

p In capitalist society the bourgeoisie, however, is opposed by the working class which forms its own ideas and sets up its own institutions. Gradually the proletarians begin to understand the essence of capitalism and become aware of the need to abolish it. They set up their own organisations to fight the bourgeoisie—a political party, trade unions, co-operatives, and so on. In the course of the revolutionary struggle the working class masters Marxist theory, creates its own morality, and its own political, legal and aesthetic views.

p The determinative role of the basis in relation to the superstructure is manifested not only in the basis giving rise to the superstructure, but also in that the essential changes in the economic system necessarily lead to changes in the superstructure. During the transition from pre-monopoly capitalism to imperialism, for example, the capitalist economy underwent important change: free competition gave way to monopoly. The bourgeois superstructure also changed accordingly. In a number of countries the capitalist 204 class went over or is going over from bourgeois-democratic forms of government to reactionary—fascist or semi-fascist forms. The rights of the working people are being increasingly curtailed and Communist parties and progressive organisations are not infrequently being persecuted. Bourgeois art and morality are degenerating, reactionary forms of idealism are becoming predominant in philosophy, and religion is spreading.

The changes in the superstructure are especially deep when one economic basis supersedes another as a result of social revolution. In the course of a revolution the political rule of the old class is replaced by the rule of the new class. A new state machinery (the system of political and legal institutions) is created in place of the old one. Social consciousness changes: the old ideology is ousted by the new corresponding to the new basis. “The old ‘superstructure’ falls apart,” Lenin wrote, “and ... a new one is created by the independent action of the most diverse social forces.”  [204•*