In this way, the first great division of labor increases the value of human labor, and creates a growth of wealth, which again increases the value of labor and makes a second division of labor necessary: handicrafts and agriculture. At this moment, the constant increase of production and with it
of the value of the human labor power makes slaves "indispensable” and creates commercial production and with it a third class: merchants.
Hence, at this moment in society, we have a triple division of labor and three classes: farmers, artisans, merchants. For the first time we see a class appear which does not participate in production, and this class, the merchant class, will dominate the other two.
The upper stage of barbarism brings us the further division of labor between agriculture and handicrafts, hence the production of a con stantly increasing portion of the products of labor directly for ex change, so that exchange between individual producers assumes the importance of a vital social function. Civilization consolidates and intensifies all these existing divisions of labor, particularly by sharp ening the opposition between town and country (the town may economically dominate the country, as in antiquity, or the country the town, as in the middle ages), and it adds a third division of labor peculiar to itself and of decisive importance. It creates a class which no longer concerns itself with production, but only with the exchange of the products—the merchants. . . . (This class) makes itself into an indispensable middleman between any two producers and exploits them both. Under the pretext... (of becoming) the most useful class of the population, a class of parasites . . . who, as a reward for their actually very insignificant services, skim all the cream off production at home and abroad, rapidly amass enormous wealth and a corre sponding social influence, and for that reason receive under civiliza tion ever higher honors and ever greater control of production until at last they also bring forth a product of their own—the periodical trade crises. (Engels, Origin of the Family, pp. 224-225.)
Hence, we see the sequence which, beginning with primitive com munism, leads us to capitalism.
1. Primitive communism.
2. Division between barbarians and pastoral tribes (first division of labor: masters and slaves).
3. Division between farmers and artisans (second division of labor). 4. Birth of a merchant class (third division of labor) which
5. Engenders periodic commercial crises (capitalism).
Now we know where classes come from; it remains for us to study:
5. What determines economic conditions?
We should first review very briefly the different societies which have preceded us.
which preceded those of antiquity. But we know, for example, that with the Greeks, masters and slaves existed and that the merchant class was already beginning to develop. Then, in the Middle Ages, feudal society, with its lords and serfs, enabled the merchants to gain more and more importance. They clustered near the castles, in the heart of the bourgs (whence the name “ bourgeois”). Moreover, in the Middle Ages, before capitalist production, there were only small enterprises, whose primary condition was that the producer be the owner of his instruments of labor. The means of production belonged to the individual and were adapted only to individual use. Consequently, they were paltry, small, and limited. The historical role of capitalist production and the bourgeoisie was to concentrate and enlarge these means of production, transforming them into the powerful levers of modern production.
. . . since the fifteenth century this has been historically worked out through the three phases of simple co-operation, manufacture and modern industry. But the bourgeoisie, as is also shown there, could not transform these puny means of production into mighty productive forces, without transforming them, at the same time, from means of production of the individual into social means of production only workable by a collectivity of men. (F. Engels, Socialism: Utopian and
Scientific, p. 56.)
Hence, we see that, parallel with the evolution of classes (masters and slaves; lords and serfs), there is an evolution of the conditions of produc tion, of distribution and of exchange of wealth, i.e., of economic condi tions, and that this economic evolution follows step by step and coincides with the evolution of the modes of production. It is therefore the
6. Modes of production
that is, the condition of instruments and tools, their utilization, labor methods, in a word, the state of technology, which determines economic conditions.
The spinning-wheel, the hand-loom, the blacksmith’s hammer were replaced by the spinning machine, the power-loom, the steam- hammer; the individual workshop, by the factory, implying the coop eration of hundreds of thousands of workmen. In like manner, produc tion itself changed from a series of individual into a series of social acts, and the products from individual to social products. (F. Engels,
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, p. 56.)
formed the productive forces. Now, while the tools of labor have become collective, the ownership of property has remained individual! Machines which can function only through collective implementation have remained the property of a single man. For this reason we see that
(The productive forces) press forward t o ... the practical recognition
of their character as social productive forces.. . . (They command)
the socialisation of great masses of means of production, which we meet with in the different kinds of joint-stock companies . . . this form also becomes insufficient. . . the official representative of capitalist society -the state- will ultimately have to undertake the direction of production__ (This) shows how unnecessary the bourgeoisie are for that purpose. All the social functions of the capitalist are now per formed by salaried employees. (F. Engels, Socialism: Utopian and
Scientific, pp. 65-67.)
Thus the contradictions of the capitalist system become clear to us:
On the one hand, perfecting of machinery, made by competition compulsory for each individual manufacturer, and complemented by a constantly growing displacement of labourers. . . . On the other hand, unlimited extension of production, also compulsory under competition, for every manufacturer. On both sides, unheard of de velopment of productive forces, excess of supply over demand, overproduction, glutting of the markets, crises every ten years, the vicious circle: excess here, of means of production and products— excess there, of labourers, without employment and without means of existence. (F. Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, p. 74.)
There is a contradiction between work which has become social and collective and property which has remained private. And so, with Marx, we shall say:
From the forms of development of productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins a period of social revolution. (Marx, "Preface,” Critique of Political Economy, p. 21.)
7. Comments
Before ending this chapter, we must make a few comments and under line the fact that, in this study, we find all the characteristics and laws of dialectics which we have just studied.
Indeed , we have just very quickly traced the history of societies, of classes and of modes of production. We see how dependent each part of
this study is on the others. We find that this history is essentially in motion and that the changes which occur at each stage of the evolution of society are provoked by an internal struggle between the different conservative and progressive elements, a struggle which ends in the destruction of one society and in the birth of a new one. Each society has a character and a structure quite different from the society which preceded it. These radical transformations occur after an accumulation of events which, in them selves, seem insignificant, but which, at a certain moment, create by their accumulation a situation which provokes an abrupt, revolutionary change.
Hence, here we recognize the characteristics and the great general laws of dialectics namely:
The interdependence of things and events. Dialectical motion and change.
Autodynamism. Contradiction. Reciprocal action.
And evolution by leaps (transformation of quantity into quality).
Readings
F. Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (New York: International Publishers, new edition 1972).
F. Engels, Socialism, Utopian and Scientific (New York: International Publishers, 1935)
H. Selsam and H. Martel, Reader in Marxist Philosophy: From the Writings
of Marx, Engels and Lenin (New York: Interational Publishers, 1963) Part
Control Questions
Chapter 1
1. What explanation of history do idealists give us? 2. What is historical materialism?
3. What was the position of 18th century materialists with regard to the explanation of history?
Chapter 2
1. Where do classes come from? 2. What are the motor forces of history?
Written Assignment