Marx’s superstructures are determined yet fundamentally necessary, not empty illusions.

Evidence

That is, so to speak, re-examining the base/superstructure problem from the perspective of “the base.” But it is also possible, within the framework of Capital , to reconstruct certain key mechanisms and tendencies of the superstructures from distinctions Marx is always drawing between the “base” lev els of production and exchange. And this helps us to understand how it can be possible to insist that, within Marxism, the superstructures are at one and the same moment “determined” and yet absolutely, fundamentally necessary and required: not empty ideological forms and illusions. This relates to what is now sometimes called the theory of Darstellung or “representation” in Marx. — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 517

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the theory of Darstellung (representation) in Marx as key to resolving why superstructures can be both determined and necessary.