The historical process is very heterogeneous, at times spasmodically, at times evolutionary, at times it even falls into stagnation. However, the eternal question is what are the driving forces of history. Asking the question about the direction of these forces gave many answers, very different in their meaning, from unrestrainedly optimistic to gloomy doomed, with elements of utopianism.
In antiquity, and not only ancient, it was very popular to believe that humanity is moving from the "golden" age to its decline. The progress and driving forces of progress led people to an extreme degree of physical relief of labor, the appearance of computers deprived a person of the development of mental research and stopped the vertical direction of development. This, of course, is an extreme point of view on the consequences of progress, but there is a grain of truth here. In history, productive forces are considered the driving forces of development, and, accordingly, their improvement leads to the further successful development of mankind with some nuances of a geographical and national character. In other words, the mode of production implies some degree of progress. driving forcesdifferent factors act, but basically it is scientific and technological progress in all spheres of society.
In the ancient world, the main mode of production was the labor of slaves, until a certain time it was quite productive and ensured the satisfaction of the needs of those societies. However, gradually the axiom that a slave cannot work fruitfully, because he is not interested in the results of his labor, prevailed, and a more progressive feudal mode of production replaced slavery. It, of course, was more productive in the early stages of its existence, however, due to the personal lack of freedom of the peasants, it also becomes unproductive at its end. Then the capitalist mode of production comes into play, here the free producer is already personally interested in the result of his labor, which means that there is a need to consolidate his right to the means of production, which would further enhance this effect.
In general, progress is a two-way process and acts selectively. Human development does not mean that all societies progress simultaneously. On the contrary, some archaic societies seem to have frozen in the Stone Age, just remember the Indians of the Amazon.
So, the driving force of progress acts only on a part of societies, and even in them it is elementary, not systemic, especially before the 17th-18th centuries. It was during this period that the most important changes in the methods of production took place. Along with bigchanges in military affairs, public administration, technical and technological process in other areas, they could be very modest and even backward. Suffice it to recall the broad industrial development of Russia in the middle of the 19th century, along with the existing serfdom. In the most complex global process, the driving forces of history were summed up and poured into a common development. The driving forces of progress, therefore, are the contradictions of progressive development.
