When classifications of various major historical phenomena, of stages, formations, civilizations, etc. in the first place, are being constructed, two principles of their construction come into collision. 1st principle-a combination of...
moreWhen classifications of various major historical phenomena, of stages, formations, civilizations, etc. in the first place, are being constructed, two principles of their construction come into collision. 1st principle-a combination of communities of the same level of development (for several or at least one parameter) into one class or some other taxon. 2nd principle-a combination of simultaneously coexisting and in some way interacting communities, or at least those impacted by the same factors (e.g. climate), into a common taxon. Let us consider the well-known Marxist classifications as an example. Classical Marxism definitely preferred the first principle 1 , although with many exceptions. The modern world-systems Marxism is clearly focused on the second principle. Coexisting and interacting communities of clearly different levels of development are united into a common system, though often having different ways of transformation, for that matter. Let's note that the basic principles of biological taxonomy are fairly close to our first principle, and ecology and adjacent disciplines focus on the second principle; i.e. approaches are put apart from each other, but in the historical disciplines, unfortunately, such a complete separation is impossible. One can indicate two fairly obvious correlations between the two principles. Firstly, the more ancient the history and the more distant (geographically) the location of the comparable communities, the less close is the relationship between them and the more important is the first principle. And, vice versa, the closer to the present, the more important is the role of the second approach. For the very ancient and remote communities the first principle is decisive, – it is in terms of development that we compare the communities of the Old and New Worlds, although it is not always convenient and not at all productive (the paths of transformation of the New and Old World communities were not strictly the same), but we simply do not have any other possibility. Secondly, despite the apparent opposition of the two principles of classification, very clear in biology, there is, in fact, no such clarity in boundaries for history. As an example of a society, let's consider the classical notion of the Bronze Age. On the one hand, all societies of the Bronze Age were united by a pronounced common feature of technological development (of the productive forces in Marxist terminology). I.e. it seems to be a classification based on the first principle, but in reality is somewhat different. Levels of 1 The productive forces determine the relations of production, and with them together constitute the basis of a society, on which the superstructure depends, the one that presents a totality of social, political and, above all, the legal relationships and forms of social consciousness.
