Thus, in fact, all the above considerations of various scientists who adhere to the materialistic position, about the driving forces of social development cannot be adequate: they are external factors or conditions that can only accelerate or slow down the process of development of these or those communities of civilization, but it is impossible to name each of them or even all these factors together, as the sources, causes or primary driving forces of the development of society.
Indeed, these phenomena and conditions to a greater or lesser extent have existed under the primitive communal system, when tens of thousands of years there was no visible development. Means, their action depends on certain hidden processes, on accumulation in human communities of some "substance". The main thing from these hidden processes is the functioning of the new – already human consciousness, outside of which the person would have remained as a primate, and this activity begins to become complicated, accelerate and be shown with bigger efficiency with growth of self-consciousness of the person, which is absent about other living beings, and this growth attracts due to the creativity more and more various information streams to the person and his communities.
The idealistic approach to the problem of the development of society as and a materialistic one, exposes a number of different factors, but mostly of an intangible character, which, in opinion of their authors, are the driving forces of social development.
Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis attributes the driving force of social development to the rooting in man of a consciously manifested the thrust towards God: "So this heavenly hail, while he is in earthly wandering, calls on citizens from all nations and recruits a itinerant society in all languages, without regard for the fact that there are various in rights, laws and institutions by which the world of the earth is established or maintained; nothing of the latter. not abolishing or destroying, but, on the contrary, saving everything, that, although is different for other peoples, but is directed to the same goal of the earthly world, unless it hinders the religion that teaches to honoring of one supreme and true God "[7. About a God's hail. XIX, 17].
The thrust to God means first of all the aspiration of the person to get closer to perfection, but, as we know, good intentions can lead away in the opposite direction up to such limit where opportunities for development disappear completely. Almost all religious sects and such large confession as Muslim are an example of it.
Pitirim Sorokin believes the accumulation of base of scientific knowledge is the main source of development, as a result of which the contradictory variety of real-life sociocultural systems will be transformed to a certain integrated sociocultural layer [8].
Scientific knowledge in itself is dead – it is necessary to manage to apply it in a timely manner in time without manifestation of negative results, otherwise – instead of transformation of systems in the progressive direction will happen regress, that was being happened incalculable number of times, and which threatens especially now from "achievements" of genetics.
Gabriel Tarde notes that the driving force behind the development of society is the creative mind in the form of rationalization of tools of work and life, including the inventive. The last Tard considers as an adaptation mechanism, without which it is difficult for a person to apply himself to changing environmental conditions.
The new arises as a result of the activity of a few gifted individuals. Then the process of imitation begins. In particular, according to the Tarde, the assertion of the basic social institutions was due to the inability of ordinary people to invent, and they began to imitate the innovators [9].
The inventive first of all develops technologies, but practically does not touch the sphere of the spirit, the senses, i.e., it mounts kind of the shell, but not the inner – spiritual and cultural – content of the person and his communities. The inventive does not affect national-being features, at this, some of the new technologies can lead society to the collapse weaning the person to work creatively and stupefying him, which, in particular, is happening now in the information sphere, they even are able completely to annihilate mankind by super-powerful weapons, genetic experiments or poisonous substances.
Protestantism regards labor as the source of the development of society, believing that labor is a manifestation in each person of his chosenness by God. In particular, Jean Calvin argued that every Christian must firmly believe in chosenness of a person by God, and throughout his life to tirelessly seek more and more confirmation to this faith, achieving successes in worldly activities, which is the criterion of the chosenness by God [10].
Only one labor is not able to improve as the world of any individual, and to affect significantly the development of communities. Labor can not only do the person more honorable and improve everyday life, but also lead to stultifying, for example, by its monotony and mismatch to the true abilities and interests of the person, and, on the contrary, the time, free from labor, can give the chance to the person to define in itself additional abilities and skills, to develop them, in particular, to improve the process of labor, and an able idler can pity the silly worker and so improve the work process that its productivity will increase many times over, and the work process will become more pleasant and more interesting.
In actuality, conscious labor, unlike the work of bees or termites, is appeared only with the formation of self-consciousness, which has detached the person partly from the animal components of the environment, and allowed him not instinctively as earlier, but with full consciousness of the case to formulate tasks and perform them, consciously changing the environment to achieve the set goals, gaining thereby liberty.
A.J. Toynbee has come to the conclusion that the driving forces of the development of society are the activities of personalities by chosen by God, military aggression, unprofitable resource and geographical position [11].
The activities of God's chosen personalities, as follows from the definition of this driving force of development of communities, clearly points to supervisor of this force, that, on the one hand, expresses external character this force, and on the other hand, the definition unites Christianity with Muslim fatalism depriving autonomy all historical development.
Wars cannot be the primary cause of the community development – they are not even secondary, but tertiary factors that affect civilizational development, since, as a rule, they are being caused by a conflicts in relation to property and resources between the elites of different states.
Unfavorable resource and geographical location, as it is visible from real historical examples, is capable not only to promote (Japan), but also to slow down, development of communities (Pakistan) as well as not to influence this process (Bulgaria) at all. Therefore, these factors cannot be qualified as primary driving forces of social development.
P. Lavrov argued that the critical consciousness of the intelligentsia is the driving force of social development.
In this respect, Peter Lavrov noted: "Philosophical ideas are important not as a manifestation of the process of development of the spirit in its logical abstraction, but as logical forms of consciousness by a person of higher or lower dignity, more extensive or closer goals of own existence; they are important as a form of protest against the present in the name of the desire for a better and more just social order or as the forms of satisfaction by the present" [12, p. 19-28]; "Ideals of a person's life are realizable only in society; but – society, as an ideal unit, finds its real realization only in the unity of personal goals. At all the division of parties, at the struggle of opinions, at the struggle of interests, only then the struggle is reasonable, useful for society and progressive, when the disputants are on the same soil and represent only different aspects of the human moral ideal. As soon as there is nothing in common between disputants, once human dignity has lost its guideline importance in the struggle of individuals and masses, only a catastrophe that completely changes social forms and personal relationships can lead to progressive development"[13, 506-507].