The concept of “universal world history” was first proposed by Kant, and was subsequently given a unique connotation by Hegel and Marx respectively. Kant put “universal world history” in the constitution of the world citizen and tried to realize it in the form of “union of peoples”; Hegel, on the other hand, placed his trust in the absolute spirit, “the idea of the universal form”, to realize the world-historicization of the absolute spirit and the absolute spiritualization of world history. However, in Marx’s view, “universal world history” is a social state of existence in which human beings enter into communism on the basis of “universal relations of communication” and the elimination of the “dominant-subordinate” world relations of production.Since the establishment of capitalist private ownership, the world history has been dominated not by the Hegelian “idea of the universal form”, but by the private relations of production dominated by the logic of capital. In this regard, Marx argues that only through the development of the productive forces, the transformation of history into world history, the formation of “universal classes” and the consequent construction of “universal relations of communication” could communism, as the true “universal world history”, be possible.

　　Editor: Zhong Yao  Wei Xiaoxue

　　From:Studies on Marxism.2025.No.3.