‘Base and Superstructure’ is the title of this blog. And so you might think it’s central to my approach to politics.
That’s true, as far as it goes. But it turns out it impacts things in a variety of ways.
‘Base’ and ‘superstructure’ are complementary terms from Marxist theory. They are the two sides of a division of society. The base includes human labor power and its tools, machines, etc. It also includes people’s relations in economic production. Think about, for example, employers and employees, coworkers, etc. The superstructure includes most of the rest of visible society: culture, religion, ideology, values, beliefs, social institutions, personal and group identities, etc.
