Part 14 (1/2)

There can be little doubt that Marx and Engels, in this early p.r.o.nunciamento, were purposely ambiguous in their language. For example, they demand ”the extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state.” This is plainly a conservatively capitalistic or a revolutionary Socialist measure entirely according to the degree to which, and the hands by which, it is carried out--and the same is evidently true of the appropriation of land rent and the abolition of inheritance. This is what Marx means when he says that every such measure is ”self-contradictory and must be such of necessity.” Up to a certain point they put capitalism on ”a larger basis”; if carried beyond that, they may, _in the right hands_, become steps in Socialism.

Marx and Engels were neither able nor willing to lay out a program which would distinguish sharply between measures that would be transitional and those that would be Socialist sixty or seventy years after they wrote, but merely gave concrete ill.u.s.trations of their policy; they stated explicitly that such reforms would vary from country to country, and only claimed for those they mentioned that they would be ”pretty generally applicable.” Yet, understood in the sense in which it was originally promulgated and afterwards explained, this early Socialist program still affords the most valuable key we have as to what Socialism is, if we view it on the side of its practical efforts rather than on that of abstract theories. Marx and Engels recognize that the measures I have mentioned must be acknowledged as ”insufficient and untenable,”

because, though they involve ”inroads on the rights of property,” they do not go far enough to destroy capitalism and establish a Socialistic society. But they rea.s.sure their Socialistic critics by pointing out that these ”insufficient” and ”transitory” measures, ”in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, _necessitate further inroads on the old social order_, and are indispensable as a means of entirely revolutionizing the mode of production.” (My italics.)

That is, ”State Socialism” is indispensable as a basis for Socialism, indeed necessitates it, provided Socialists look upon ”State Socialist”

measures chiefly as transitory _means_ ”to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling cla.s.s”; for this rise of the proletariat to the position of ruling cla.s.s is necessarily ”the _first step_ in the revolution of the working cla.s.s.”

From the day of this first step the whole direction of social evolution would be altered. For, while the Socialists expect to utilize every reform of capitalist collectivism, and can only build on that foundation, their later policy would be diametrically opposed to it. A Socialist government would begin immediately an almost complete reversal of the statesmans.h.i.+p of ”State Socialism.” The first measure it would undertake would be to begin at once to increase wages _faster than the rate of increase of the total wealth of the community_. Secondly, within a few years, it would give to the ma.s.ses of the population, according to their abilities, all the education needed to fill _from the ranks of the non-capitalistic cla.s.ses_ a proportion of all the most desirable and important positions in the community, corresponding to their numbers, and would see to it that they got these positions.

It is undoubtedly the opinion of the most representative figures of the international Socialist movement that there is not the slightest possibility that any of the non-Socialist reformers of to-day or of the near future are following or will follow any such policy, or even take the slightest step in that direction; and that there is nothing Socialists can do to force such a policy on the capitalists until they are actually or practically in power. Society may continue to progress, but it is surely inconceivable to any close observer, as it is inconceivable to the Socialists, that the privileged cla.s.ses will ever consent, without the most violent struggle, to a program which, viewed as a whole, would lead, _however gradually or indirectly_, to a more equitable distribution of wealth and political power.

FOOTNOTES:

[90] Kautsky, ”The Capitalist Cla.s.s” (pamphlet).

[91] Marx's letters to Sorge.

[92] Marx's letters to Sorge.

PART II

THE POLITICS OF SOCIALISM

CHAPTER I

”STATE SOCIALISM” WITHIN THE MOVEMENT

The Socialist movement must be judged by its acts, by the decisions Socialists have reached and the reasoning they have used as they have met concrete problems.

The Socialists themselves agree that first importance is to be attached, not to the theories of Socialist writers, but to the principles that have actually guided Socialist parties and their instructed representatives in capitalist legislatures. These and the proceedings of international and national congresses and the discussion that constantly goes on within each party, and not theoretical writings, give the only truthful and reliable impression of the movement.

In 1900 Wilhelm Liebknecht, who up to the time of his death was as influential as Bebel in the German Party, pointed out that those party members who disavowed Socialist principles in their _practical application_ were far more dangerous to the movement than those who made wholesale theoretical a.s.saults on the Socialist philosophy, and that political alliances with capitalist parties were far worse than the repudiation of the teachings of Karl Marx. In his well-known pamphlet _No Compromise_ he showed that this fact had been recognized by the German Party from the beginning.

I have shown the Socialists' actual position through their att.i.tude towards progressive capitalism. An equally concrete method of dealing with Socialist actualities is to portray the various tendencies _within_ the movement. The Socialist position can never be clearly defined except by contrasting it with those policies that the movement has rejected or is in the process of rejecting to-day. Indeed, no Socialist policy can be viewed as at all settled or important unless it has proved itself ”fit,” by having survived struggles either with its rivals outside or with its opponents inside the movement.

If we turn our attention to what is going on within the movement, we will at once be struck by a world-wide situation. ”State Socialism” is not only becoming the policy of the leading capitalistic parties in many countries, but--in a modified form--it has also become the chief preoccupation of a large group among the Socialists. ”Reformist”

Socialists view most of the reforms of ”State Socialism” as installments of Socialism, enacted by the capitalists in the hope of diverting attention from the rising Socialist movement.

To Marx, on the contrary, the first ”step” in Socialism was the conquest of complete political power by the Socialists. ”The proletariat,” he wrote in the Communist Manifesto ”will use _its political supremacy_ to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the capitalists, to centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the State, _i.e. of the proletariat organized as the ruling cla.s.s_.” (My italics.) Here is the ant.i.thesis both of ”reformist” Socialism within the movement and of ”State Socialism” without. The working people are _not_ expected to gain more and more political power step by step and to use it as they go along. It is only _after_ gaining full political _supremacy_ by a revolution (peaceful or otherwise) that they are to socialize industry step by step. Marx and his successors do not advise the working people to concentrate their efforts on the centralization of the instruments of production in the hands of governments as they now are (capitalistic), but only _after_ they have become completely transformed into the tools of the working people ”organized as the ruling cla.s.s,” to use Marx's expression.[93]

The central idea of the ”reformist” Socialists is, on the contrary, that before Socialism has captured any government, and even before it has become an imminent menace, it is necessary that Socialists should take the lead in the work of social reform, and should devote their energies very largely to this object. It is recognized that capitalistic or non-Socialist reformers have taken up many of the most urgent reforms and will take up more of them, and that being politically more powerful they are in a better position to put them into effect. But the ”reformist” Socialists, far from allowing this fact to discourage them, allege it as the chief reason why they must also enter the field. The non-Socialist reformers, they say, are engaged in a popular work, and the Socialists must go in, help to bring about the reforms, and claim part of the credit. They then propose to attribute whatever success they may have gained, not to the fact that they also have become reformers like the rest, but to the fact that they happen to be Socialists. The non-Socialist reformers, they say again, are gaining a valuable experience in government; the Socialists must go and do likewise.

Reforms which were steps in capitalism thus become to them steps in Socialism. It is not the fas.h.i.+on of ”reformists” to try to claim that they are very great steps--on the contrary, they usually belittle them, but it is believed that agitation for such reforms as capitalist governments allow, is the best way to gain the public ear, the best kind of political practice, the most fruitful mode of activity.

One of the leading American Socialist weeklies has made a very clear and typical statement of this policy:--