Many persons who have thought of Socialism as a scheme, the plan of a new social edifice, have been disappointed not to find in all the voluminous writings of Marx any detailed description of such a plan, any forecast of the future. But when they have grasped the fundamental principles of the Marxian system of thought, they realize that it would be absurd to attempt to give detailed specifications of the Socialist state. As the Socialist movement has outgrown the influence of the early Utopians, its adherents have abandoned the habit of speculating upon the practical application of Socialist principles in future society. The formulation of schemes, more or less detailed, has given place to firm insistence that Socialism must be regarded as a principle, namely, the efficient organization of wealth production and distribution to the end that the exploitation of the wealth producers by a privileged cla.s.s may be rendered impossible. Whatever contributes to that end is a contribution to the fulfillment of the Socialist ideal.
Still, it is natural and inevitable that earnest Socialists and students of Socialism should seek something more tangible by way of a description of the future state than the bald statement that it will be free from the struggle between exploiting and exploited cla.s.ses. The question is, can we go further in our attempt to scan the future without entering the realms of Utopian speculation? If Socialism is, objectively considered, a state of society which is being developed in the womb of the present, are there any signs by which its peculiar form and spirit, as distinguished from the form and spirit of the present, may be visualized? Within certain limits, an affirmative answer seems possible to each of these questions. There are certain fundamental principles which may be said to be essential to the existence of Socialist society.
Without them, the Socialist state cannot exist. Regardless of the fact that Karl Marx never attempted to describe his ideal, to give such a description of his concept of the next epoch in evolution as would enable us to compare it with the present and to measure the difference, it is probable that every Socialist makes, privately at least, his own forecast of the manner in which the new society must shape itself.
There is nothing Utopian or fantastic in trying to ascertain the tendencies of economic development; nothing unscientific in trying to read out of the pages of social evolution such lessons as may be contained therein. So long as we bear in mind that our forecasts must not take the form of plans for the arbitrary shaping of the future, specifications of the Cooperative Commonwealth, but that they must, on the contrary, be based upon the facts of life--not abstract principles born in the heart"s desire--and attempt to discern the tendencies of social and economic evolution, we are upon safe ground. Such forecasts may indeed be helpful, not only in so far as they provide us with a more or less concrete picture of the ideal to be aimed at, but also, and even more important, in that they at once enable us to gauge from time to time the progress made by society toward the realization of the ideal, and to formulate our policies most effectively. Especially as there are certain fundamental principles essential to the existence of a Socialist state, we may take these and correlate them, and these principles, together with our estimate of economic tendencies, drawn from the facts of the present, may provide us with a suggestive and approximate outline of the Socialist society of the future. So far we may proceed with full scientific sanction; beyond are the realms of fancy and dream, the Elysian Fields of Utopia.[180] We must not set about our task with the mental att.i.tude so well displayed by the yearning of Omar--
"Ah Love! could you and I with Him conspire To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire, Would not we shatter it to bits--and then Remold it nearer to the Heart"s Desire!"
From that spirit only vain dreams and fantastic vagaries can ever come.
What we must bear in mind is that the social fabric of to-morrow, like that of yesterday, whose ruins we contemplate to-day, will not spring up, complete, in response to our will, but will grow out of social experience and needs.
II
One of the greatest and most lamentable errors in connection with the propaganda of modern Socialism has been the a.s.sumption of its friends, in many instances, and its foes, in most instances, that Socialism and Individualism are entirely ant.i.thetical concepts. Infinite confusion has been caused by setting the two against each other. Society consists of an aggregation of individuals, but it is something more than that in just the same sense as a house is something more than an aggregation of bricks. It is an organism, though as yet an imperfectly developed one.
While the units of which it is composed have distinct and independent lives within certain limits, they are, outside of those limits, interdependent and inter-related. Man is governed by two great forces.
On the one hand, he is essentially an egoist, ever striving to attain individual freedom; on the other hand, he is a social animal, ever seeking a.s.sociation and avoiding isolation. This duality expresses itself in the life of society. There is a struggle between its members motived by the desire for individual expression and gain; and, alongside of it, a sense of solidarity, a movement to mutual, reciprocal relations, motived by the gregarian instinct. All social life is necessarily an oscillation between these two motives. The social problem in its last a.n.a.lysis is nothing more than the problem of combining and harmonizing social and individual interests and actions springing therefrom.
In dealing with this social problem, the problem of how to secure harmony of social and individual interests and actions, it is necessary first of all to recognize that both motives are equally important and necessary agents of human progress. The idea largely prevails that Socialists ignore the individual motive and consider only the social motive, just as the ultra-individualists have erred in an opposite discrimination. The Socialist ideal has been conceived to be a great bureaucracy. Mr. Anstey gave humorous and vivid expression to this idea in _Punch_ some years ago, when he represented the citizens of the Socialist state as being all clothed alike, known only by numbers, strangers to all the joys of family life, plodding through their allotted tasks under a race of hated bureaucrats, and having the solace of chewing gum in their leisure time as a specially paternal provision.
Some such mental picture must have inspired Herbert Spencer"s "Coming Slavery," and it must be confessed that the early forms of Socialism which consisted mainly of detailed plans of cooperative commonwealths afforded some excuse for the idea. Most intelligent Socialists, if called upon to choose between them, would probably prefer to live in Thibet under a personal despotism, rather than under the hierarchies of most of the imaginary commonwealths which Utopian Socialists have depicted.
Even in the later propaganda of the modern political Socialist movement, there has been more than enough justification for those who regard Socialism as impossible except under a great bureaucracy. In numberless Socialist programmes and addresses Socialism has been defined as meaning "The social ownership and control of all the means of production, distribution, and exchange." Critics of Socialism are not to be seriously blamed if they take such "definitions" at their face value and interpret them quite literally. It is not difficult to see that in order to place "all means of production, distribution, and exchange" under social ownership and control, the creation of such a bureaucracy as the world has never seen would be necessary. A needle is a means of production quite as much as an electric power machine in a factory is, the difference being in their degrees of efficiency. A jackknife is, likewise, in certain circ.u.mstances, a means of production, just as surely as a powerful planing machine is, the difference being in degrees of efficiency. So a market basket is a means of distribution quite as surely as an ocean steamship is; a wheelbarrow quite as much as a locomotive. They differ in degrees of efficiency, that is all. The idea that the housewife in the future, when she wants to sew a b.u.t.ton upon a garment, will be obliged to go to some department and "take out" a needle, having it properly checked in the communal accounts, and being responsible for its return, is, of course, worthy only of opera bouffe.
So is the notion of the state owning wheelbarrows and market baskets and making their private ownership illegal. "The socialization of _all_ the means of production, distribution, and exchange," literally interpreted, is folly. But none of those using the phrase must be regarded as seriously contemplating its literal interpretation. For many years the phrase was included in the statement of its "Object" by the English Social Democratic Federation, and even now it appears in a slightly modified form, the word "all" being omitted,[181] perhaps because of its tautological character. For several years the writer was a member of the Federation, actively engaged in the propaganda, and how we spent much of our time explaining to popular audiences in halls and upon street corners that the socialization of jackknives, needles, sewing machines, market baskets, beer mugs, frying pans, and toothpicks was not our aim, is a merry memory.
When this is understood, the nightmare of the bureaucracy of Socialism vanishes. It is no longer necessary to fret ourselves asking how a government is to own and manage everything without making slaves of its citizens. The question propounded by that venerable and distinguished Canadian scholar, Professor Goldwin Smith,[182] whether a government can be devised which shall hold all the instruments of production, distribute to the citizens their tasks, pick out inventors, philosophers, artists, and laborers, and set them to work, without destroying personal liberty, loses its force when it is remembered that Socialism involves no such necessity.
The Socialist ideal may be said to be a form of social organization in which every individual will enjoy the greatest possible amount of freedom for self-development and expression; and in which social authority will be reduced to the minimum necessary for the preservation and insurance of that right to all individuals. There is an incontestable right of the individual to full and free self-development and expression so long as no other individual"s right to a like freedom is infringed upon. No individual right can be an _absolute_ right in a society, but must be subject to such restrictions as may be necessary to safeguard the like right of every other individual, and of society as a whole. _Absolute_ personal liberty is not possible; to grant it to any one individual would be equivalent to denying it to others. If, in a certain community, a need is commonly felt for a system of drainage to protect the citizens against the perils of a possible outbreak of typhoid or some other epidemic disease, and all the citizens agree upon a scheme except two or three, who, in the name of personal liberty, declare that their property must not be touched, what is to be done? If the citizens, out of solicitude for the personal liberty of the objecting individuals, abandon or modify their plans, is it not clear that the liberty of the many has been sacrificed to the liberty of the few, which is the essence of tyranny? Absolute individual liberty is incompatible with social liberty. The liberty of each must, in Mill"s phrase, be bounded by the like liberty of all. Absolute personal liberty is a chimera, a delusion.
Even the Anarchist must come to a realization of the fact that liberty is not an absolute, but a relative and limited, right. Kropotkin, for example, realizes that, even under Anarchism, any individual who did not live up to his obligations, or who persisted in conducting himself in a manner obnoxious or injurious to the community, would have to be expelled.[183] This is very like Spencer"s practical abandonment of the doctrine of _laissez faire_ individualism. Says he: "Many facts have shown us that while the individual man has acquired liberty as a citizen and greater religious liberty, he has also acquired greater liberty in respect of his occupations; and here we see that he has simultaneously acquired greater liberty of combination for industrial purposes. Indeed, in conformity with the universal law of rhythm, _there has been a change from excess of restriction to deficiency of restriction_. As is implied by legislation now pending, the facilities for forming companies and raising compound capitals have been too great."[184] Here is a very definite confession of the insufficiency of natural law, the failure of the _laissez faire_ theory, and a virtual appeal for restrictive and coercive legislation.
This is inevitable. The dual forces which serve as the motives of individual and collective action, spring, unquestionably, from the fact that individuals are at once alike and unlike, equal and unequal. Alike in our needs of certain fundamental necessities, such as food, clothing, shelter, cooperation for producing these necessities, for protection from foes, human and other, we are unlike in tastes, appet.i.tes, temperaments, character, will, and so on, till our diversity becomes as great and as general as our likeness. Now, the problem is to insure equal opportunities of full development to all these diversely const.i.tuted and endowed individuals, and, at the same time, to maintain the principle of equal obligations to society on the part of every individual. This is the problem of social justice: to insure to each the same social opportunities, to secure from each a recognition of the same obligations toward all. The basic principle of the Socialist state must be justice; no privileges or favors can be extended to individuals or groups of individuals.
III
Politically, the organization of the Socialist state must be democratic.
Socialism without democracy is as impossible as a shadow without light.
The word "Socialism" applied to schemes of paternalism, and to government ownership when the vital principle of democracy is lacking, is a misnomer. As with Peter Bell--
"A primrose by a river"s brim, A yellow primrose was to him"
and nothing more than that, so there are many persons to whom Socialism signifies nothing more than government ownership. Yet it ought to be perfectly clear that Russia, with her state-owned railways, and liquor and other monopolies, is no nearer Socialism than the United States. The same applies to Germany with her state railways. Externally similar in one respect to Socialism, they radically differ. In so far as they prepare the necessary forms for Socialism, all examples of public ownership may be said to be "socialistic," or making for Socialism. What they lack is a spiritual quality rather than a mechanical one. They are not democratic. Socialism is political democracy allied to industrial democracy.
Justice requires that the legislative power of society rest upon universal adult suffrage, the political equality of all men and women, except lunatics and criminals. It is manifestly unjust to exact obedience to the laws from those who have had no share in making them and can have no share in altering them. Of course, there are exceptions to this principle. We except (1) minors, children not yet arrived at the age of responsibility agreed upon by the citizens; (2) lunatics and certain cla.s.ses of criminals; (3) aliens, non-citizens temporarily resident in the state.
Democracy in the sense of popular self-government, the "government of the people, by the people, and for the people," of which political rhetoricians boast, is only approximately attainable in any society.
While all can equally partic.i.p.ate in the legislative power, all cannot partic.i.p.ate directly in the administrative power, and it becomes necessary, therefore, to adopt the principle of delegated authority, representative government. But care must be taken to preserve a maximum of power in the hands of the people. In this respect the United States Const.i.tution is defective. It is not, and was not intended by its framers to be, a democratic instrument,[185] and we are vainly trying to-day to make democratic government through an undemocratic medium. The political democracy of the Socialist state must be real, keeping the power of government in the hands of the people.
How is this to be done? Direct legislation by the people might be realized through the adoption of the principles of popular initiative and referendum. Or, if representative legislative bodies should be deemed best, these measures, together with proportional representation and the right of recall, might be adopted. There is no apparent reason why _all_ legislation, except temporary legislation as in war time, famine, plague, and such abnormal conditions, could not be directly initiated and enacted, leaving only the just and proper enforcement of the law to delegated authority. In practically all the political programmes of Socialist parties throughout the world, these principles are included at the present time; not merely as means to secure a greater degree of political democracy within the existing social state, but also, and primarily, to prepare the required political framework of democracy for the industrial commonwealth of the future.
The great problem for such a society, politically speaking, consists in choosing wisely the trustees of delegated power and authority, and seeing that they justly and wisely use it for the common good, without abuse, either for the profit of themselves or their friends, and without prejudice to any portion of society. Will there be abuses? Will not political manipulators and bosses betray their trusts? To these questions, and all other questions of a like nature, the Socialist can only give one answer, namely, that there is no such a thing as an "automatic democracy," that eternal vigilance will be the price of liberty under Socialism as it has ever been. There can be no other safeguard against the usurpation of power than the popular will and conscience ever alert upon the watch-towers. With political machinery so responsive to the popular will when it is a.s.serted and an alert and vigilant electorate, political democracy attains its maximum development. Socialism requires that development.
IV
With these general principles prevised, we may consider, briefly, the respective rights of the individual and of society. The rights of the individual may be summarized as follows: There must be freedom of movement, including the right to withdraw from the domain of the government, to migrate at will to other territories. Freedom of movement is a fundamental condition of personal liberty, but it is easy to see that it cannot be made an absolute right. Quarantine laws, for social protection, for example, may seriously inconvenience the individual, but be imperatively necessary for all that. There must be immunity from arrest, except for infringing others" rights, with compensation of some kind for improper arrest; respect of the privacy of domicile and correspondence; full liberty of dress, subject to decency; freedom of utterance, whether by speech or publication, subject only to the protection of others from insult, injury, or interference with their equal liberties, the individual being held responsible to society for the proper use of that right. Freedom of the individual in all that pertains to art, science, philosophy, and religion, and their teaching, or propaganda, is essential. The state can have nothing to do with these matters, they belong to the personal life alone.[186] Art, science, philosophy, and religion cannot be protected by any authority of the state, nor is such authority needed.
Subject to the ultimate control of society, certainly, but normally free from collective authority and control, these may be regarded as imperative rights of the individual. Doubtless many Socialists, in common with many Individualists, would considerably extend the list.
Some, for instance, would include the right to possess and bear arms for the defense of person and property. On the other hand, it might be objected with good show of reason by other Socialists that such a right must always be liable to abuses imperiling the peace of society, and that the same ends would be served more surely if individual armament were made impossible. Again, some Socialists, like some Individualists, would include in the category of private acts outside the sphere of law and social authority the union of the s.e.xes. They would do away with legal intervention in marriage and make it and the parental relation exclusively a private concern. On the other hand, probably an overwhelming majority of Socialists would object. They would insist that the state must, in the interest of the children, and for its own self-preservation, a.s.sume certain responsibilities for, and exercise a certain control over, all marriages. They would have the state insist upon such conditions as mature age, freedom from dangerous diseases and physical defects. While believing that under Socialism marriage would no longer be subject to economic motives,--matrimonial markets for t.i.tles and fortunes no longer existing,--and that the maximum of personal freedom together with the minimum of social authority would be possible in the union of the s.e.xes, they would still insist upon the necessity of that minimum of legal control.
The abolition of the legal marriage tie, and the subst.i.tution therefor of voluntary s.e.x union, which so many people believe to be part of the Socialist programme, is not only not a part of that programme, but is probably condemned by more than ninety-five per cent of the Socialists of the world, and favored by no appreciable proportion of Socialists more than non-Socialists. There is no such thing as a Socialist view of marriage, any more than there is a Republican or Democratic view of marriage; or any more than there is a Socialist view of vaccination, vivisection, vegetarianism, or homeopathy. The same may be said of the drink evil and tobacco smoking. Some Socialists would prohibit both smoking and drinking; others would permit smoking, but prohibit the manufacture of intoxicating liquors; most Socialists recognize the evils, especially of drunkenness, but believe that it would be foolish at this time to state in what manner the evils must be dealt with by the Socialist state.
Our hasty summary by no means exhausts the category of personal liberties, nor does it rigidly define such liberties. To presume to do that would be a piece of charlatanry, social quackery of the worst type.
It is not for the Socialist of to-day to determine what the citizens of a generation hence shall do. The citizens of the future, like the citizens of to-day, will be living human beings, not mere automatons; they will not accept places and forms imposed upon them, but make their own. The object of this phase of our discussion is simply to show that individual freedom would by no means be crushed out of existence by the Socialist state. The intolerable bureaucracy of collectivism is wholly an imaginary evil. There is nothing in the nature of Socialism as it is understood to-day by its adherents which would prevent a wide extension of personal liberties in the social regime.
In the same general manner, we may summarize the princ.i.p.al functions of the state[187] as follows: the state has the right and power to organize and control the economic system, comprehending in that term the production and distribution of all social wealth, wherever private enterprise is dangerous to the social well-being, or is inefficient; the defense of the community from invasion, from fire, flood, famine, or disease; the relations with other states, such as trade agreements, boundary treaties, and the like; the maintenance of order, including the juridical and police systems in all their branches; and public education in all its departments. It will be found that these five functions include all the services which the state may properly undertake, and that not one of them can safely be intrusted to private enterprise. On the other hand, it is not at all necessary to a.s.sume that the state must have an _absolute monopoly_ of any one of these groups of functions in the social organism. It would not be necessary, for example, for the state to prohibit its citizens from entering into voluntary relations with the citizens of other countries for the promotion of international friendship, for trade reciprocity, and so on. Likewise, the juridical functions being in the hands of the state would not prevent voluntary arbitration; or the state guardianship of the public health prevent voluntary a.s.sociations of citizens from taking measures to advance the health of their communities. On the contrary, all such efforts would be advantageous to the state. Our study becomes, therefore, a study of social physiology.
The principle already postulated, that the state must undertake the production and distribution of wealth wherever private enterprise is dangerous, or inefficient, clarifies somewhat the problem of the industrial organization of the Socialist regime, which is a vastly more difficult problem than that of its political organization. Socialism by no means involves the suppression of all private industrial enterprises.
Only when these fail in efficiency or result in injustice and inequality of opportunities does socialization present itself. There are many petty, subordinate industries, especially the making of articles of luxury, which might be well allowed to remain in private hands, subject only to such general regulation as might be found necessary for the protection of health and the public order. For example, suppose that the state undertakes the production of shoes upon a large scale as a result of the popular conviction that private enterprise in shoemaking is either inefficient or injurious to society in that the manufacturers exploit the shoemakers on the one hand, and, through the establishment of monopoly-prices, the consumers upon the other hand. The state thus becomes the employer of shoeworkers and the vender of shoes to the citizens. But A, being a fastidious citizen, does not like the factory product of the state any more than he formerly did the factory product of private enterprise. Under the old conditions, he used to employ B, a shoemaker who does not like factory work, a craftsman who likes to make the whole shoe. Naturally, B was not willing to work for wages materially lower than those he could earn in the factory. A willingly paid enough for his hand-made shoes to insure B as much wages as he would get in the factory. What reason could the state possibly have for forbidding the continuance of such an arrangement between two of its citizens?
Or take the case of a farmer maintaining himself and family upon a modest acreage, by his own labor. He exploits no one, and the question of inefficiency does not present itself as a public question, for the reason that there is plenty of farming land available, and any inefficiency of the small farmer does not injure the community in any manner. What object could the state have in taking away that farm and compelling the farmer to work upon a communal, publicly owned and managed farm? Of course, the notion is perfectly absurd.[188] On the other hand, there are things, natural monopolies, which cannot be safely left to private enterprise. The same is true of large productive and distributive enterprises upon which great ma.s.ses of the people depend.
Land ownership[189] and all that depends thereon, such as mining, transportation, and the like, must be collective.
It will help us to get rid of the difficulty presented by petty industry and agriculture if we bear in mind that collective ownership is not, as is commonly supposed, the supreme, fundamental condition of Socialism. It is proposed only as a means to an end, not as the end itself. The wealth producers are exploited by a cla.s.s whose source of income is the surplus-value extracted from the workers. Instinctively, the workers struggle against that exploitation, to reduce the amount of surplus-value taken by the capitalists to a minimum. To do away with that exploitation social ownership and control is proposed. If the end could be attained more speedily by other methods, those methods would be adopted. It follows, therefore, that to make collective property of things not used as a means of exploiting labor does not necessarily form part of the Socialist programme. True, some such things might be socialized in response to an urgent demand for efficiency, but, of necessity, the struggle will be princ.i.p.ally concerned with the socializing of the means of production which are used as means of exploitation by a cla.s.s deriving its income from the surplus-value produced by another cla.s.s. It is easy enough to see that, according to this principle of differentiation, it would be necessary to socialize the railroad, but not at all necessary to socialize the wheelbarrow; while it would be necessary to socialize a clothing factory, it would not be necessary to take away a woman"s domestic sewing machine.
Independent, self-employment, as in the case of a craftsman working in his own shop with his own tools, or groups of workers working cooperatively, is quite consistent with Socialism.
In the Socialist state, then, certain forms of private industry will be tolerated, and perhaps even definitely encouraged by the state, but the great fundamental economic activities will be collectively managed. The Socialist state will not be static and, consequently, what at first may be regarded as being properly the subject of private enterprise may develop to an extent or in directions which necessitate its transformation to the category of essentially social properties. Hence, it is not possible to give a list of things which would be socialized and another list of things which would remain private property, but perfectly possible to state the principle which must be the chief determinant of the extent of socialization. With this principle in mind it is fairly possible to sketch the outlines at least of the economic development of the collectivist commonwealth; the conditions essential to that stage of social evolution at which it will be possible and natural to speak of capitalism as a past and outgrown stage, and of the present as the era of Socialism.
Socialists, naturally, differ very materially upon this point. Probably, however, an overwhelming majority of the leaders of Socialist thought in Europe and this country would agree with the writer that it is fairly probable that the economic structure of the new society will include at least the following measures of socialization: (1) Ownership of all natural resources, such as land, mines, forests, waterways, oil wells, and so on; (2) operation of all the means of transportation and communication other than those of purely personal service; (3) operation of all industrial production involving large compound capitals and a.s.sociated labor, except where carried on by voluntary, democratic cooperation, with the necessary regulation by the state; (4) organization of all labor essential to the public service, such as the building of schools, hospitals, docks, roads, bridges, sewers, and the like; the construction of all the machinery and plant requisite to the social production and distribution, and of things necessary for the maintenance of those engaged in such public services as the national defense and all who are wards of the state; (5) a monopoly of the monetary and credit functions, including coinage, banking, mortgaging, and the extension of credit to private enterprise.
With these economic activities undertaken by the state, a pure democracy differing vitally from all the cla.s.s-dominated states of history, private enterprise would by no means be excluded, but limited to an extent making the exploitation of labor and public needs and interests for private gain impossible. Socialism thus becomes the defender of individual liberty, not its enemy.
V
As owner of the earth and all the major instruments of production and exchange, society would occupy a position which would enable it to insure that the physical and mental benefits derived from its wealth, its natural resources, its collective experience, genius, and labor, were universalized as befits a democracy. It would be able to guarantee to all its citizens the right to labor, through preventing private or cla.s.s monopolization of the land and instruments of production and social opportunities in general. It would be in a position to make every development from compet.i.tion to monopoly the occasion for further socialization. Thus there would be no danger to the state in permitting, or even fostering, private industry within the limits described. As the organizer of the vast body of labor essential to the operation of the main productive and distributive functions of society, and to the other public services, the state would automatically, so to speak, set the standards of income and leisure which private industry would be compelled, by compet.i.tive force, to observe. The regulation of production, too, would be possible, and as a result the crises arising from glutted markets would disappear. Finally, in the control of all the functions of credit, the state would effectually prevent the exploitation of the ma.s.s of the people through financial agencies, one of the greatest evils of our present system.
The application of the principles of democracy to the organization and administration of these great economic services of production, exchange, and credit is a problem full of alluring invitations to speculation.
"This that they call the Organization of Labor," said Carlyle, "is the Universal Vital Problem of the World." This description applies not to what we commonly mean by the "organization of labor," namely, the organization of the laborers in unions for cla.s.s conflict, but to the organization of the brain and muscle of the world to secure the greatest efficiency. This is the great central problem of the socialization of industry and the state, before which all other problems pale into insignificance. It is comparatively easy to picture an ideal political democracy; and the main structural economic organization of the Socialist regime, with its private and public functions more or less clearly defined, is not very difficult of conception. These are foreshadowed with varying degrees of distinctness in present society, and the light of experience illumines the pathway before us. It is when we come to the methods of organization and management, the _spirit_ of the economic organization of the future state, that the light fails and we must grope our way into the great unknown with imagination and our sense of justice for guides.
Most Socialist writers who have attempted to deal with this subject have simply regarded the state as the greatest employer of labor, carrying on its business upon lines not materially different from those adopted by the great corporations of to-day. Boards of experts, chosen by civil service methods, directing all the economic activities of the state--such is their general conception of the industrial democracy of the Socialist regime. They believe, in other words, that the methods now employed by the capitalist state, and by individual and corporate employers within the capitalist state, would simply be extended under the Socialist regime. If this be so, a psychological anomaly in the Socialist propaganda appears in the practical abandonment of the claim that, as a result of the cla.s.s conflict in society, the public ownership evolved within the capitalist state is essentially different from, and inferior to, the public ownership of the Socialist ideal. It is perfectly clear that if the industrial organization under Socialism is to be such that the workers employed in any industry have no more voice in its management than the postal employees in this country, for example, have at the present time, it cannot be otherwise than absurd to speak of it as an industrial democracy.
Here, in truth, lies the crux of the greatest problem of all. We must face the fact that, in anything worthy the name of an industrial democracy, the terms and conditions of employment cannot be wholly decided without regard to the will of the workers themselves on the one hand, nor, on the other hand, by the workers alone without reference to the general body of the citizenry. If the former method fails to satisfy the requirements of democracy by ignoring the will of the workers in the organization of their work, the alternate method involves a hierarchical government, equally incompatible with democracy. Some way must be found by which the industrial government of society, the organization of production and distribution, may be securely and fairly based upon the dual basis of common civic rights and the rights of the workers in their special relations as such.
And here we are not wholly left to our imaginations, not wholly without experience to guide us. In actual practice to-day, in those industries in which the organization of the workers into unions has been most successful, the workers, through their organizations, do exercise a certain amount of control over the conditions of their employment. Their right to share in the determination of the conditions of labor is conceded. They make trade agreements, for instance, in which such matters as wages, hours of labor, apprenticeship, output, engagement and discharge of workers, and numerous other matters, are provided for and made subject to the joint control of the workers and their employers. Of course, this share in the control of the industry in which they are employed is a right enjoyed only as a fruit of conquest, won by war and maintained by ceaseless vigilance and armed strength. It is not inconceivable that in the Socialist state there might be a frank extension of this principle. The workers in the main groups of industries might form autonomous organizations for the administration of their special interests, subject only to certain fundamental laws of the state. Thus the trade unions of to-day would evolve into administrative politico-economic organizations, after the manner of the mediaeval guilds, and become constructive agencies in society instead of mere agencies of cla.s.s warfare as at present.