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each one sufficient leisure, so that what is of value in culture, science, art, social intercourse and so forth, may continue, and be turned from being a monopoly of the ruling class into the common possession of the whole of society. This is the important point. For as soon as the productive power of human labour has developed thus far, there is no longer any reason for the existence of a ruling class.

(3) The Theory of Accumulation lays it down that the number of great capitalists is on the decrease.

(4) The Theory of Pauperization asserts that the intellectual and material condition of the proletariat under the capitalist system, instead of improving, grows constantly worse and worse.

(5) The Theory of Self-Destruction asserts that Capitalism is digging its own grave. The occurrence of commercial crises, coming as they do with constantly increasing force, proves conclusively the failure of the prevailing economic system to maintain its predominance. The crises are the symptoms of the bankruptcy of the existing social order; and one day they will become so extensive that recovery will become quite impossible.

362. The Economic Failure of Capitalism19

BY J. RAMSAY MACDONALD

Commercialism is a phase in the evolution of industrial organisation, and is not its final form. It arose when nations were sufficiently established to make national and international markets possible, and it created classes and interests which separated themselves from the rest of the community and which proceeded to buttress themselves behind economic monopolies, social privileges, political power. The new industrial régime supplanted feudalism when the historical work of feudalism was done and it had ceased to be useful, and proceeded to build up a method of wealth production and distribution regulated by nothing but the desire for individual success and private gain. The new power lost sight of social responsibilities and social coherence. The interests of the individual capitalist, of the class of capitalists, of the property owners, were put first, and those of the community as a whole were subordinated. It was hoped, that by the individual capitalist pursuing his own interest national well-being would be served. The error soon reaped its harvest of misery, when women and children were dragged into the factories late in the eighteenth and early in the nineteenth centuries, when people were gathered into foul industrial towns, and when only

19The Socialist Movement, 94-99. Copyright by Henry Holt & Co. (1911).

human endurance limited the length of the working day. So separate had become the interests of the nation from those of the propertied classes that the latter found profit from the degradation and deterioration of the population. It mattered not to the cotton owner of Lancashire a hundred years ago what became of the children who were working in his factories, or later on, what became of the women who took their places. When one "hand" died another "hand" was ready to step into his place, and whether his life was long or short, sad or merry, the machines which he tended spun out their enormous profits, and the owner saw no reason to believe that the day of his prosperity was short.

The system certainly solved the problem of production. Under its whips and in search of its prizes, mechanical invention proceeded apace, labour was organised and its efficiency multiplied ten, twenty, an hundred fold. Statistics in proof of this live with the wonder that is in them. That twenty men in Lancashire to-day can make as much cotton as the whole of the old cotton-producing Lancashire put together; that 1,000 shoe operatives in Leicester can supply a quarter of a million people with four pairs of boots a year; that 120 men in a mill can grind enough flour to keep 200,000 people's wants fully supplied, seem to come from the pages of romance rather than from the sober history of industry. Commercialism has written those pages, and they are its permanent contribution to human well-being.

As time went on, however, it was seen that this wonderful system of production was quite unable to devise any mechanism of distribution which could relate rewards to deserts. Distribution was left to the stress and uncertainty of competition and the struggle of economic advantages. The law of the survival of the fittest was allowed to have absolute sway, under circumstances which deprived it of moral value. The result was that national wealth was heaped up at one end over a comparatively small number of people and lay thinned out at the other end over great masses of the population. At one end people had too much and could not spend it profitably, at the other end they had too little and never gained that mastery. of things which is preliminary to well-ordered life. Moreover, even many of those who possessed held their property on such precarious tenure that possession gave them little security and peace of mind. Prosperity was intermittent both for capital and labour.

Then conscious effort to rectify the chaos began to show itself. The national will protected the national interests through factory and labour legislation, and at the same time the chaos within the

system was being modified by the life of the system itself. Competition worked itself out in certain directions, and coöperation in the form of trusts came to take its place, as nature turns to hide up the traces of war in a country that has been fought over. This new organization is more economical and may steady to some extent the demand for labour; but it means that economic power is being placed in the hands of a few. That is too dangerous in the eyes of the Socialist. Its operation is too uncertain. From his very nature the monopolist is an exploiter. He grasps the sceptre of state, as well as the sceptre of industry. He sits in Parliament as well as in the counting-house. He becomes a powerful citizen as well as a masterful captain of industry. He raises in a most acute form the problem of how the community can protect itself against interests being created round its exploitation and enslavement. Competition solves its own problems and leaves those of monopoly in their place.

Surveying the same field with an eye on the moral fruits which it has borne, the Socialist once more discovers weeds in plenty. The familiar methods of adulteration and of all forms of sharp dealing, both with work-people and with customers, pass before his eyes in disquieting masses. Honesty on this field is not the best policy. Materialist motives predominate. Birth and honour bow to wealth. Wealth can do anything in "good" society to-day-even to the purchase of wives as in a slave market. A person may be vulgar, may be uncultured, may be coarse and altogether unpleasing in mind and manner but, if he has money, the doors of honour are thrown open to him, the places of honour are reserved for his occupation. The struggle for life carried on under the conditions. of commercialism means the survival of sharp wits and acquisitive qualities. The pushful energy which brings ledger successes survives as the "fittest" under commercialism. Capitalism has created a rough and illworking mechanism of industry and a low standard of value based upon nothing but industrial considerations, and it has done its best to hand over both public and private values to be measured by this standard and to be produced by this mechanism.

But the controlling influences which have been brought to bear upon it-both those of a political character from without and those of an industrial character from within-are the foreshadowings of a new system of organization. Commercialism lays its own cuckoo egg in its nest. Every epoch produces the thought and the ideals which end itself. Like a dissolving view on a screen, commercialism fades away and the image of Socialism comes out in clearer outline.

D. THE CASE FOR SOCIALISM

363. The Distinction between Socialism and Communism20

BY M. TUGAN-BARANOWSKY

The distinction between Socialism and Communism is commonly thought to lie in that Socialism demands only that the means of production be transferred to the community, admitting private property in objects of use, whilst Communism claims complete abolishment of private property. But this is not quite correct. In the first place it is not possible to draw exact boundaries between means of production and objects of use. Nor is it correct to maintain that Socialism demands the socialization of all implements of work, or means of production. Most socialists assign to every family, a separate house, involving individual possession of means of production, for instance, utensils, tableware and books not read for a pastime. Even under Socialism certain instruments of production retain the quality of private property.

But there are a great many objects the private possessions of which collectivist society can by no means grant. Many things serving for immediate use and enjoyment, museums, gardens, etc., already form objects of public property. Under a socialistic arrangement this class will be considerably expanded. In such a social state there will be three classes of objects of use: one belonging to the community as such, to the use of which all shall have free access; one likewise social property, the individual use of which shall be granted for a certain compensation; and one shall consist of objects possessed by individuals as private property.

But even communism does not include the complete disappearance of property. The organization of social production, to whatever extent it may develop, will find on its way many an object of use, which owing to its very nature must be left in individual possession, for instance clothing. However broadly the principle of Communism may be carried out, it will never succeed in dressing two individuals in one coat at one and the same time, and every coat must therefore practically be the property of him who wears it.

The principle distinction between Socialism and Communism cannot, therefore, lie in the criterion referred to. In view of this fact many are inclined to identify the two. It is, however, not impossible to mark out the point of difference between these systems. Amongst collectivist systems it is easy to discern two fundamental

20 Adapted from Modern Socialism in Its Historical Development, 14-18 (1905).

types. According to one the individual income is adjusted by determining the sum total the individual may dispose of to satisfy his wants. According to the other the very notion of income as a determined value is rejected, the immediate wants only being regulated or recognized as absolutely free. Under the order of the first type the distribution of products proceeds by means of a money system, were it but an ideal one; every individual spends his income; everything must have its price. In other words, money as a standard of value and purchasing power represents an indispensable organ of distribution; whereas in the organization of the second type, in which illimited freedom of consumption is admitted, and not the income, but the use it is put to is being controlled, money as an instrument of distribution is not at all necessary. Social economy of the first type supposes the use of money, while that of the second type has no use for money at all.

364. The Central Aim of Socialism21

BY THOMAS KIRKUP

The central aim of socialism is to terminate the divorce of the workers from the natural sources of subsistence and of culture. The socialist theory is based on the historical assertion that the course of social evolution for centuries has gradually been to exclude the producing classes from the possession of land and capital, and to establish a new subjection, the subjection of workers who have nothing to depend on but precarious wage-labour. Socialists maintain that the present system leads inevitably to social and economic anarchy, to the degradation of the working man and his family, to the growth of vice and idleness among the wealthy classes. and their dependants, to bad and inartistic workmanship, to insecurity, waste, and starvation; and that it is tending more and more to separate society into two classes, wealthy millionaires confronted with an enormous mass of proletarians, the issue out of which must either be socialism or social ruin. To avoid all these evils and to secure a more equitable distribution of the means and appliances. of happiness, socialists propose that land and capital, which are the requisites of labour and the sources of all wealth and culture, should be placed under social ownership and control.

In thus maintaining that society should assume the management of industry and secure an equitable distribution of its fruits, socialists are agreed; but on the most important points of details they differ very greatly. They differ as to the form society will take "Adapted from A History of Socialism, 8-12 (1900).

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