p Dialectical and historical materialism are organic parts oi" Marxist-Leninist philosophy. Historical materialism is that part which studies the life of society. Other sciences are also engaged in the study of social life, for example, political economy, educational science, jurisprudence, etc. What is it, then, that distinguishes historical materialism from all other social sciences? Each of these sciences deals with an individual aspect of social life, looking in detail at all its specific laws and features. For example, political economy investigates the economic relations 13 existing among people, and the laws of production and distribution of material benefits. Educational science deals with the education and teaching of people. As distinct from these sciences, historical materialism deals with the general aspects of development of society as a whole: the structure of society, the interaction between various aspects of social life, and the general laws and motive forces of social development.

p An essential feature of historical materialism is that it considers the life of society from the standpoint of philosophy. It investigates philosophical issues such as the correlation between the material and ideal aspects of social life; the correlation between the spontaneous and the conscious, the objective and the subjective in the historical process; the motive forces of society’s evolution; the issue of the essence of man and his place in the world, etc. Historical materialism is therefore a philosophical science about society, part of Marxist-Leninist philosophy.

p In literature around the world, the theory of society as an integral system, and of the laws governing its functioning and development is usuallycalled sociology. In actual fact, historical materialism is an underlying sociological theory of Marxism-Leninism, since it studies the general laws of the functioning and development of society as ah integral system. However, historical materialism is not the whole of Marxist-Leninist sociology.

p There are three interconnected levels within the structure of Marxist-Leninist sociology:

p 1. Individual empirical (specific sociological) studies: the collection of facts and statistics, surveys among certain categories of people (through interviews and questionnaires), etc. MarxismLeninism has always attached great importance to such methods of studying social phenomena and processes. It was this kind of research that Lngels and Lenin relied upon when writing The Condition of the Working Class in England and The Development of Capitalism in Russia, respectively. At present, specific sociological studies are carried out on a broad scale in all socialist countries. In the Soviet Union, for example, careful examination is made of changes in people’s attitude to work, relations within work collectives, transformations occurring in classes and social groups, etc.

p 2. On the basis of individual empirical studies conclusions, scientific generalisations and special theories are made. For example, in studying changes that have taken place among the collective-farm peasants in the LISSR over the period of Soviet power, Marxist sociologists have concluded that the general educational standards, skills and knowledge of this class have risen substantially, that their psychology has undergone a fundamental change, and that in many ways they are drawing closer to the working class and working intelligentsia.

p 3. When carrying out empirical research, Marxist sociologists rely on historical materialism, i. e. on the generalised knowledge it has accumulated on classes, the structure of society, social laws, etc. In its turn, the generalised knowledge gained as a result of specific sociological studies is a source for the enrichment of historical materialism with new theoretical propositions, and provides a foundation for its creative development. Thus, in the system of MarxistLeninist sociology, historical materialism represents both the general theory and methodology of specific social studies.

As a whole, historical materialism can he defined as a philosophical and sociological science concerned with the most general laws and motive forces of the development of society.