The Structure of Society and the Middle Class: State, Development Prospects
Authors:   Institute of Industrial Economics of the NAS of Ukraine, Buleev I. 
Published: December 2020

The article examines the main stages of the development of society from prehistoric times to the present, the transformation of its structure. In contrast to the traditional perception of a person as a biosocial subject, he is viewed as a spiritually-bio-social subject in nature in a “spiritually-socially-natural” system. The research methods based on consistency, the concept of three forces of development, dialectics and trialectics are used. The category of spirituality in relation to a person and society is considered, a significant change in the ratio of "spiritual" and "material" is noted, it is proved that in the conditions of intellectualization of society, its transformation into post-industrial (hyperindustrial), the dominant development is spirituality, and the basis of social relations is the institutions of spirituality of the people, values, morality, responsibility. It is noted that any society capable of creating added value is divided into two main parts: rich and poor, opposing both in economic relations, the distribution of added value, and in other social relations, in culture, education, etc. Between them there is the middle part of society, interested in maintaining its stability, law and order, spirituality, values, their evolutionary development, etc. In the industrial era of capitalism, this part of society grows significantly as a result of an increase in the standard of living, professionalism of workers to the level necessary for industrial production. At the stage of the formation of capitalism, the theory of classes is developing and the middle part of society is reasonably attributed to the main classes, called the middle class (MC). The middle class became basic in the stabilization of society, its spiritual and economic development. The study notes the inappropriateness of the spread of the definitions of class theory, the theory of the middle class to pre-capitalist and post-industrial societies. SK is a category of capitalist society. As society transforms from the industrial stage of economic development into financial-oligarchic capitalism, into a post-industrial (hyperindustrial) society, the objective conditions for the quantitative growth of middle class are curtailed. ICT, intellectualization of production and society sharply reduce the need for labor. The number of the UK is declining. 10-20% of the most professionally trained (up to the level of scientific workers) specialists stand out from the middle class and move to the lower part of the upper class. The rest (up to 80% of the UK) – go to the lower class. As a result, the UK is practically liquidated. In order to preserve the stability of a society based on market relations, the state and its elite must consciously support and preserve the middle part of society, into which the industrial middle class is being transformed, which is necessary for the functioning of the internal market and society. The article substantiates the preconditions and conditions for the formation and transformation of the middle class in developing and post-capitalist countries, including Ukraine. In economically developed countries that have embarked on the path of formation of post-industrial (hyperindustrial, new integral) societies, two ways of changing their structure are possible: further differentiation in terms of income, assets, spirituality; or the formation of a society of average sufficiency, where there is a convergence of classes and strata of the population in terms of quality of life, spirituality, etc. The substantiation and possibilities of this or that vector of development of society require further theoretical research and their testing in practice.