Why did Marx believe material and economic conditions drive history?

Karl Marx believed that material and economic conditions drive history because he argued that humans must first produce the means of their subsistence before they can engage in any other activity, such as politics, law, or philosophy. This foundational requirement means that the way a society organizes its production—its "mode of production"—forms the real basis upon which all other social, political, and intellectual processes are built.123

In Marx’s view, history is a continuous process of change driven by the evolution of these material forces, such as technology and raw materials, and the corresponding social relations of production. As these forces become more complex, they create internal contradictions that eventually lead to revolutionary upheavals, replacing one economic system with another. Consequently, Marx posited that it is not human consciousness that determines existence, but rather social existence that determines consciousness. Ideas and social institutions are thus viewed as a "superstructure" that arises from and reflects the underlying economic base. This theory, known as historical materialism, suggests that the motor of history is the ongoing tension between the material conditions of life and the social structures that regulate them.1324