We have made references to the class struggle contained within the theory of the materialist conception, and that these struggles have resulted in changes in the basis of society.

A class is a group of people united by a common interest. Economically, a group with 'basically similar economic interests. The class struggle is the struggle between social classes with different economic interests, that is different positions in society in relation to the production and distribution of the social wealth - the working class and the capitalist class, the feudal proprietors and the rising capitalists, each class striving to obtain control of political power so that society shall be organised to suit their interest. Thus all class struggles are political struggles, aimed at getting control of state power.

With the advent of private property in the past the state grew to defend property, against any encroachment upon it. Consequently any class that sought to change the framework of society to suit its interests had first of all to get control of the state, the organised power of coercion, or be powerful enough to influence its operations.

Mankind differs from all other animals in that whereas they draw their subsistence direct from nature with the use of their physical organs unassisted by anything else, men make contrivances that enlarge the power and scope of their organs and enable them to get more from nature with less effort. In other words man builds an artificial barrier between himself and nature by his inventions, contrivances and social arrangements. In the course of time this barrier has more and more influence on the way he thinks and acts because of its social consequences. Thus it comes about that it is the inventions and not the intentions of man which have raised him above the purely animal world; and that have given rise to ideas of liberty, of justice, and of equality at different times. These concepts that are alleged to be absolute are really, like everything else, relative, depending upon changing social systems as well as upon social position. They differ between historical periods and also between people within the same period.

Since the coming of private property moral, intellectual, political and religious ideas have been bound up with different forms of private ownership. These forms of property have split society into antagonistic classes which have engaged in bitter class struggles, each class striving to dominate society and serve its own interests. As we look back through history we see that it is made up of these class conflicts, and that they are the vital thread from which progress has been woven - meaning by progress an ever wider adaptation to natural forces and the bringing nearer of the possibility of humanity, as a whole, achieving comfort and security.

Each new form of production has brought into being new social classes, a change in social relations, a change in political alignment, and a change in current ideas. The freeman and slave of antiquity looked upon the social world through different eyes from those of the feudal lord and bondsman of the middle ages, and likewise the capitalist and the worker of today have different ideas from those of their medieval counterparts. To understand the ideas of a period it is necessary to examine the economic framework of the period from which the ideas are derived, because the economic framework is the dominating influence. Ideas carried over from old outworn systems are carried over into the new, but these traditions are forced into the mould of the new system, though they may have some influence on the shape of the mould. One has only to consider what Christianity is now and what it was a thousand years ago to appreciate this.

The confused social outlook of a period, including the present, is the outcome of the mixture of ideas thrown up by the different classes that together make up society, but the prevailing, or the most insistent and politically supreme, ideas are those backed by the dominant class; they remain so until another class becomes sufficiently strong, and conscious of its interests, to challenge the dominant class and get control of state power.

In the past society has been made up of a number of conflicting classes - monarchs, landowners, traders, peasants, workers - but under capitalism these classes have been reduced to two, workers and capitalists. The modern struggle is between these two classes, and capitalism has now become a fetter on further social development. To free society of war, crises, unemployment, poverty, the workers must capture control of the state and introduce a new system, one in which the means of production and distribution will be owned in common by the whole of society.