ABSTRACT
Non-antagonistic contradictions arise within the context of antagonistic struggle. According to the well-known Hegelian schema, contradictions are resolved through specific actions that ‘surpass’ them, leading to a new and higher unity, a movement which suggests the image of a forward-surging spiral. The cosmic contradiction between city and countryside is therefore between the functional organization of bureaucratic and corporate power and territorially organized power. Corporate power will seek to impose its own principle of social organization, the pursuit of private gain, on territorial forms of organization. Within the core countries of western capitalism, functional patterns of social integration were winning out over divided territorial powers almost everywhere. And as the contradictions between city and countryside were slowly overcome, the class struggle was left as the major and unchallenged conflict within the national domain. The modem city is losing its external and formal structure.
