The origins of productive force determinism

In order to understand the origins of productive force determinism we need a much more specific analysis of the intellectual and historical influences at work in the formation of Marx's historical materialism as it appears for the first time in its mature form in The German Ideology. Saint-Simon was an important influence on Marx's productive force determinism in his portrayal of production as the chief object of social organisation and in his conception of society containing the germ of its own destruction in the generation of forces which would make that social form superfluous. The origins of Marxism in German philosophy have received more than their fair share of attention. Although Marx claimed credit for this discovery Engels could have at least claimed as much. Productive force determinism can be added to the 'number of basic and enduring Marxist propositions (which) first surface in Engels' rather than Marx's early writings'.