System, Structure and Contradiction in Capital

Abstract

Is it possible to analyse the relations between an event and a structure. or to explain the genesis and evolution of that structure, without being forced to abandon a structuralist viewpoint? These two questions are topical, and some have already hazarded an affirmative reply. A new situation is emerging, one of the aspects of which is the resumption of a dialogue between structuralism and Marxism. This is hardly surprising, as Marx himself, a century ago, described the whole of social life in terms of "structures", advanced the hypothesis of the necessary existence of correspondences between infrastructures and superstructures characterizing different "types" of society, and, lastly, claimed the ability to explain the "evolution" of these types of society by the emergence and development of "contradictions" between their structures.