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Rudolf Steiner e.Lib
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Basic Issues of the Social Question
Rudolf Steiner e.Lib Document
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Basic Issues of the Social Question
Basic Issues: Chapter One: The true nature of the Social Question
On-line since: 13th July, 2002
The true nature of the Social Question
Does not the catastrophe of the World War demonstrate the deficiency
of the thinking which for decades was supposed to have understood the
will of the proletariat? Does not the true nature of the social
movement stand revealed by the fact of this catastrophe?
It is necessary to ask these questions, for the demands of the
proletariat, previously suppressed, are surging to the surface now
that the powers of suppression have been partially destroyed. But to
maintain the position which these powers took in relation to the
social urges of a large part of mankind is something which can only be
desired by someone totally ignorant of the indestructibility of such
impulses in human nature.
Many of the key people who were able to influence the European powers
which in 1914 were intent on rushing headlong into the catastrophe of
war were victims of a great illusion in respect to these impulses.
They actually believed that a military victory for their side would
still the impending social storm. They have since had to admit that
their own behaviour gave the social urges the impetus they were
waiting for. Indeed, the present human catastrophe has revealed itself
to be the historical event through which these urges attained to their
full driving force.
During these last fateful years the leading persons and classes have
had to condition their behaviour to the attitudes of the socialist
circles, although if it had been possible to ignore them they would
gladly have done so. The form events have since taken is the result of
these attitudes. Now that a decisive stage in preparation for
decades has been reached, a tragedy unfolds in that thinking
has not kept pace with events. Many people who have been trained to
think in terms of developments in which they saw social ideals are now
helpless when confronted with the grave problems which the facts
present.
Some still believe that their ideas concerning a restructuring of
society will somehow be realized and prove sufficiently efficacious to
guide events in a positive direction. The deluded opinion that the old
scheme of things should be retained in spite of the demands of a
majority of mankind can be dismissed off-hand, and attention should be
shifted to those who are convinced of the necessity for social
renewal. In any case we are obliged to admit that party platforms
wander around amongst us like so many mummified ideas which are
continuously refuted by the facts. These facts require decisions for
which party programs are unprepared. The political parties have
evolved along with events, but have fallen behind in respect of their
thinking habits. It is perhaps not presumptuous to maintain that these
conclusions which are contrary to what is generally believed
can be properly arrived at through a correct appraisal of
contemporary events. It is possible to deduce from this that the times
should be receptive to a characterization of the social life of
mankind which, in its originality, is foreign to the thinking of most
socially oriented personages as well as to party lines. It is quite
possible that the tragedy of the attempts to solve the social question
is attributable to a misunderstanding of the meaning of the
proletarian struggle even on the part of those whose ideas have
originated in that struggle. For men are by no means always able to
derive correct judgements from their own desires.
It would therefore appear justified to ask the following questions:
What does the modern proletarian movement really want? and does
this correspond to what is generally considered to be its objective by
the non-proletariat and the proletariat alike? Does the true nature of
the social question agree with what is commonly thought about it
or is a completely different way of thinking necessary? This
question can hardly be answered objectively except by one who has been
in a practical position to understand the modern proletarian mind,
especially the minds of those members of the proletariat who have been
instrumental in determining the direction which the social movement
has taken.
Much has been said about the development of modern technology and
capitalism, the birth of a new proletariat: and how this proletariat's
demands have arisen within the new economic system. Much of what has
been said is relevant, but that nothing decisive has been touched upon
is evident to anyone who has not been hypnotized by the idea that
external conditions determine the nature of human life, and who is
objectively aware of the impulses which originate in the human soul.
It is true that the demands of the proletariat have arisen during the
evolution of modern technology and capitalism; but the recognition of
this fact says nothing about the purely human impulse residing in
these demands. As long as these impulses are not fully understood, the
true nature of the social question will remain
inscrutable.
The significance of the following expression is apparent to anyone who
has become familiar with the deep-seated, internal forces of the human
will: the modern worker has become class-conscious. He no longer
instinctively follows the lead of the other social classes; he
considers himself to be a member of a separate class and is determined
to influence the relations between his class and the others in a
manner which will be advantageous to his own interests. The
psychological undercurrents related to the expression class
conscious, as used by the modern proletariat, provide an insight
into the mentality of a working class which is bound up with modern
technology and capitalism. It is important to recognize the profound
impression which scientific teachings about economics and its
influence on human destiny have made on the mind of the proletarian.
Here a fact is touched upon concerning which many people who can only
think about the proletarian and not with him have murky, if not
downright dangerous notions, considering the seriousness of
contemporary events. The opinion that the uncultivated
worker has been deceived by Marxism and the proletarian writers who
promulgate it, is not conducive to an understanding of the historical
situation. This opinion reveals a lack of insight into an essential
element of the social movement: that the proletarian class
consciousness has been cultivated by concepts which derive from modern
scientific developments. The sentiment expressed in Lassalle's speech
Science and the Worker
[Note 2]
continues to dominate this consciousness. This may seem unimportant to
certain practical people. Nevertheless, a truly effective
insight into the modern labour movement requires that attention be
focused on this subject. What both the moderate and radical wings of
the proletarian movement are demanding reflects the economic science
which has captivated their imagination and not as has been maintained,
economic life itself somehow transformed into a human impulse. This is
clearly illustrated by the journalistically popularized scientific
character of proletarian literature; to deny it is to shut one's eyes
to the facts. A fundamental, determining characteristic of the present
social situation is that the modern proletarian is able to define the
content of his class consciousness in scientifically oriented
concepts. The working man at his machine may be far removed from
science as such; nevertheless, he hears the explanation of
his situation from others whose knowledge is derived from this
science.
All the discussion about the new economics, the machine age,
capitalism, etc., may be most enlightening in respect to the
underlying causes of the proletarian movement. However, the
determining factor of the present social situation is not that the
worker has been harnessed to a machine within the capitalistic system,
but that certain thoughts, influenced by his dependent position within
the capitalistic world order, have developed in his class
consciousness. It may be that the thought habits of the present
inhibit recognition of the implications of this fact and make it
appear that to emphasize it constitutes no more than a dialectic game
of concepts. This must be answered as follows: there is no prospect of
a successful intervention in modern society without comprehension of
the essential elements involved. Anyone who wishes to understand the
proletarian movement must first of all know how the proletarian
thinks. For this movement from its moderate efforts at reform
to its most excessive abuses is not activated by
non-human forces or economic impulses, but by
people, by their ideas and by their will.
The decisive ideas and will-forces of the contemporary social movement
are not contained in what technology and capitalism have implanted in
the proletarian consciousness. The movement has turned to modern
science for the source of its ideas, because technology and capitalism
were not able to provide the worker with the human dignity his soul
needed. This dignity was available to the medieval artisan through his
craft, to which he felt humanly related a situation which allowed him
to consider life in society as worth living. He was able to view what
he was doing as the realization of his strivings as a human being.
Under capitalism and technology, however, he had no recourse but
himself his own inner being in seeking the basis for an
understanding of what a human being is; for this basis is not
contained in capitalism and technology. Therefore, the proletarian
consciousness chose the path of scientifically oriented thinking. The
inherently human element of society had been lost. Now this happened
at a time when the leading classes were cultivating a scientific mode
of thinking which no longer possessed the spiritual impact necessary
to satisfy the manifold needs of an expanding human consciousness. The
old world-conceptions considered the human being to be a soul-entity
existing within a spiritually existential framework. According To
modern scientific thought, however, he is no more than a natural being
within the natural order of things. This science is not experienced as
a current which flows into man's mind from a spiritual world which
also sustains his soul. An impartial consideration of history reveals
that scientific ideation has evolved from religious ideation; this has
to be admitted in spite of how one may feel about the relationship
between the various religious impulses and modern scientific thinking.
But these old world conceptions with their religious foundations were
not able to impart their soul-sustaining impulses to modern modes of
thinking. They withdrew and tried to exist outside these modes of
thinking at a consciousness level which the proletarian mind found
inaccessible. This level of consciousness was still of some value to
the members of the ruling classes, as it more or less corresponded to
their social position. These classes sought no new conceptions because
tradition enabled them to retain the old. But the worker, stripped of
his traditions, found his life completely transformed. Deprived of the
old ways, he lost the ability to take sustenance from spiritual
sources from which he had also been alienated. Broadly
speaking, modern scientism developed simultaneously with technology
and capitalism, attracting in the process the faith and confidence of
the modern proletariat in search of a new consciousness and new
values. But the workers acquired a different relationship to scientism
than did the members of the ruling classes, who did not feel the need
to adapt their own psychological needs to the new scientific outlook.
In spite of being thoroughly imbued with the scientific
conception of causal relationships leading from the lowest
animal up to man, it remained for them a purely theoretical
conviction; they did not feel the necessity to restructure their lives
according to this conviction. The naturalist Vogt and the popular
science writer Büchner, for example, were certainly imbued with the
scientific outlook. Alongside this outlook, however, something was
active in their minds which enabled them to retain certain attitudes
in life which can only be justified through belief in a universal,
spiritual order of things. How differently scientism affects someone
whose life is firmly grounded in such circumstances and the modern
proletarian who is continuously harangued by agitators during his few
free hours with such things as: modern science has cured man of
believing that he has a spiritual origin; he knows now that in
primitive times he clambered indecorously around in trees and that he
has a purely natural origin. The modern proletarian found himself
confronted with such ideas whenever he sought a psychological
foundation which would permit him to find his place in the scheme of
things. He became deadly serious about the new scientism and drew from
it his own conclusions about life. The technological, capitalistic age
affected him quite differently than it did the ruling classes, whose
way of life was still supported by spiritually rewarding impulses; it
was in their interest to adapt the accomplishments of the new age to
this life-style. The proletarian however, had been deprived of his old
way of life which, in any case, was no longer capable of providing him
with a sense of his value as a human being. The only thing which
seemed capable of providing the answer to the question: What is a
human being? was the new scientific outlook, equipped as it was
with the powers of faith derived from the old ways.
It is of course possible to be amused at the description of the
proletarian's manner of thinking as scientific; but only
by equating science with what is acquired through years of attendance
at institutes of higher learning, and by contrasting it to
the consciousness of the proletarian, who is unlearned.
Such amusement ignores one of the decisive facts of contemporary life,
namely, that many a highly educated person lives unscientifically,
while the unlearned proletarian orients his entire way of life
according to a science which he perhaps does not even possess. The
educated person has taken science and pigeon-holed it in a compartment
of his mind, but his sentiments are determined by societal relations
which do not depend on this science. The proletarian however is
obliged by his circumstances to experience existence in a way which
corresponds to scientific convictions. His level of knowledge may well
be far removed from what the other classes call
scientific; his life is nevertheless oriented by
scientific ideation. The life-style of the other classes is determined
by a religious, an aesthetic, a general cultural foundation; but for
him science, down to its most insignificant details, has
become dogma. Many members of the leading classes consider
themselves to be enlightened, free-thinking.
Scientific conviction certainly lives in their intellects, but their
hearts still pulse with unnoticed vestiges of traditional beliefs.
What the old ways did not transmit to the scientific outlook was the
awareness of a spiritual origin. The members of the ruling classes
could afford to disregard this characteristic of modern scientism
because their lives were still determined by tradition. The members of
the proletariat could not tradition had been driven from their
souls by their new position in society. They inherited the scientific
outlook from the ruling classes and turned it into the basis for a
conception of the essence of man a conception, a
spiritual substance which was ignorant of its own
spiritual origin, which in fact denied its origin in the spirit.
I am well aware of what effect these ideas will have on non-members of
the proletariat and members alike, who feel themselves to be
practical people and who consequently consider what has
been said here to be remote from reality. But the facts which are
emerging from the world situation will eventually prove this opinion
erroneous. An objective consideration of these facts reveals that a
superficial interpretation of life only has access to ideas which no
longer coincide with the facts. Prevailing thought has been
practical for so long that it has not the slightest
relationship to the facts. The present catastrophic world situation
could be a lesson for many: what did they think would happen, and what
did happen? Must this also be the case with social thinking?
I can also imagine the reproach of someone who professes the
proletarian viewpoint: Another one who would like to divert the
basic issues of the social question on to paths which are amenable to
the bourgeoisie. Such a person does not realize that, although
destiny has placed him in a proletarian milieu, his mode of thinking
has been inherited from the ruling classes. He lives
proletarian, but he thinks bourgeois. The new times do not only
require a new way of life, but also a new way of thinking. The
scientific outlook will become life-sustaining only if its manner of
dealing with the question of a fully human content to life attains to
a force equal to that which animated the old conceptions.
A path is herewith indicated which leads to the discovery of one
element of the modern proletarian movement. At the end of this path a
conviction is intoned in the proletarian mind: I seek a
spiritual life. But spiritual life is an ideology, a reflection in
people of outward occurrences which does not originate in a spiritual
world. What has emerged in modern times in the transition from
the old cultural-spiritual life is regarded by the proletariat as
ideology. In order to capture the mood of the proletarian mind as it
manifests itself in social demands, it is necessary to realize what
effect the view that spiritual life is an ideology can have. It is
possible to object that the average worker knows nothing of this view,
that it more likely addles the half-educated minds of his leaders. To
hold this opinion is to be ignorant of the facts, is to be unaware of
what has taken place in the lives of the working classes during the
last decades, is to be blind to the relationship which exists between
the view that spiritual life is an ideology, the demands and deeds of
the so-called ignorant radical socialists and the acts of
those who hatch revolutions out of obscure impulses.
It is tragic that there is so little empathy for the emerging mood of
the masses and for what is really taking place in people's minds. The
non-proletarian listens with anxiety to the demands of the proletariat
and hears the following: Only through socialization of the means
of production is it possible for me to attain to a dignified human
existence. What he does not realize is that his class, in the
transition from the old times to the new, has not only set the
proletarian to work at means of production which are not his, it has
also failed to provide him with nourishment for his soul. People who
think in the way described above may claim that the worker simply
wants to attain to the same standard of living which the ruling
classes possess, and they will ask what this has to do with his soul.
Even the worker may contend that he claims nothing from the other
classes for his soul, that he only wants them to stop exploiting him
and that class differences cease to exist. Such talk does not reach
the essence of the social question, reveals nothing of its true
nature. For had the working population inherited a genuine spiritual
content from the ruling classes, and not one which considers spiritual
life to be an ideology, then its social demands would have been
presented quite differently. The proletarian is convinced of the
ideological nature of spiritual life, but becomes steadily unhappier
as the result of his conviction. The effects of this unconscious
misery, from which he suffers acutely, outweigh by far in importance
for the present social situation the justified demands for an
improvement in external conditions.
The members of the ruling classes do not recognize themselves as the
authors of the militancy which confronts them from the proletarian
world. But they are the authors in that they have bequeathed to the
proletariat a spiritual life which is bound to be considered an
ideology.
The social movement is not characterized by the demand for a change in
the living standards of a particular social class, but rather by how
the demand for this change is translated into reality by means of the
thought-impulses of this class. Let us consider the facts for a moment
from this point of view. We will see how those persons who like to
think along proletarian lines smile at the contention that any
spiritual endeavour could possibly contribute toward solving the
social question. They dismiss it as ideology, as abstract theory. They
think that no meaningful solutions to the burning social questions of
the day can come from mere ideas, from a so-called spiritual life. But
upon closer examination it becomes obvious that the nerve centre, the
fundamental impulse of the modern proletarian movement, does not
reside in what the proletarian talks about, but in ideas.
The proletarian movement is to an extent perhaps unequaled by
any similar movement in history a movement born of ideas. The
more closely it is studied, the more emphatically is this seen to be
true. This conclusion has not been arrived at lightly. For years I
taught a wide range of subjects in a workers' educational institute
[Note 3].
Through this experience I have come to recognize what is alive and
striving in the modern proletarian worker's soul; I was also able to
observe the activities of the various labour and trade unions. I feel,
therefore, that I do not base myself on mere theoretical
considerations, but on the results of actual experience.
To know the modern workers' movement where it is being carried out by
workers (unfortunately, this is seldom the case as far as the leading
intellectuals are concerned) is to recognize the profound significance
of the fact that a certain trend of thought has captured the minds of
an exceedingly large number of people in an extremely intensive way.
The fact that the social classes are so antagonistic to each other
makes the formulation of a position regarding social problems quite
difficult. The middle classes of today find it very difficult to
identify with the working class and cannot therefore understand how
such an intellectually demanding dialectic as that of Karl Marx
regardless of what one may think of its content could have
found receptivity in the virgin proletarian intelligence.
Karl Marx's system of thought can be accepted by one individual and
rejected by another, perhaps with reasons which appear to be equally
valid. It was even revised after the death of Marx and his friend
Engels by those who saw society from a somewhat different viewpoint. I
do not wish to discuss here the content of this system, which is not,
in my opinion, the meaningful element in the modern proletarian
movement. Its most meaningful characteristic is, to me, the fact that
the most powerful impulse active in the working class world is a
system of thought. No practical movement with such fundamental,
everyday demands has ever stood so exclusively on a foundation of pure
ideation as does this modern proletarian movement. It is the first
movement of its kind in history to have chosen a scientific
foundation. This fact must be properly understood. What the modern
proletarian consciously has to say program-wise about
his own opinions, his wants and his feelings, does not seem to be
essential.
Most important is that the intellectual foundation for life affects
the whole man, whereas the other classes restrict it to particular
compartments of the mind. The proletarian is unable to acknowledge
this process because the life of the intellect, of thought, has been
bequeathed to him as an ideology. In reality, he builds his life on
ideation, which at the same time he considers to be unreal ideology.
It is not possible to understand the proletarian interpretation of
life and its realization through the acts of its adherents without
also comprehending this fact and its consequences for human evolution.
It follows from what has been expounded above that any description of
the true nature of the proletarian social movement must give priority
to a description of the modern worker's spiritual life. It is
essential that the worker sense the causes of his unsatisfactory
social situation and encounter the methods for changing it in this
spiritual life. Nevertheless, at present he is not yet able to do
anything except angrily or contemptuously reject the contention that a
meaningful impellent resides in these spiritual undercurrents of the
social movement. How is he to recognize an impellent, which affects
himself, in what he must consider to be an ideology! One cannot expect
to resolve an untenable social situation by means of a spiritual life
so perceived. Due to a scientifically oriented point of view not only
science itself, but also art, religion, morality and justice are
considered to be facets of human ideology by the modern proletarian.
He sees in these aspects of spiritual life nothing that relates to the
reality of his existence and which could contribute to his material
well-being. To him they are a mere reflection of the material life.
Although they may indirectly react upon man's material life through
the intellect or by influencing will impulses, they originally arose
as ideological emanations of this same material life. He feels that
they cannot contribute to the solution of social problems. The means
to the end can only originate in material reality.
The new spiritual life has been passed on by the leading classes to
the proletarian intellect in a devitalized form. It is of primary
importance that this be understood when considering the forces to be
utilized in solving the social question. Should this state of affairs
remain unchanged, then the spiritual life of mankind will be condemned
to impotence as far as the social challenges of the present and the
future are concerned. A majority of the modern proletariat is
absolutely convinced of this impotence, a belief which is brought to
expression through Marxism and similar confessions. It is said that
modern capitalism has evolved from older economic forms, that this
evolution has placed the proletariat in an untenable position with
respect to capital, that the evolution will continue until capitalism
destroys itself by means of the forces inherent in it and that the
liberation of the proletariat will coincide with the death of
capitalism. Later socialist thinkers have divested this conviction of
the fatalistic character assigned to it by certain Marxist circles.
Nevertheless, its essential nature remains, as is evidenced by the
fact that it would not occur to a contemporary socialist to say that
the incentive for the social movement could derive from an interior
life born of impulses of the times and which has its roots in
spiritual reality.
The mental attitude of the person forced to lead a proletarian life is
determined by the fact that he cannot cherish such expectations. He
needs a spiritual life which emanates the strength to enable him to
sense his human dignity. Being harnessed to the modern capitalistic
economic order, his soul necessarily thirsted for some such spiritual
life. But the spiritual life handed to him by the ruling classes
created an emptiness in his soul. The present-day social movement is
determined by the fact that the modern proletarian desires a quite
different relationship to spiritual life than the contemporary social
order can give him; and this is what is behind his demands. This fact
is clearly [not] understood neither by the proletariat nor by the
non-proletariat. The non-proletarian does not suffer under the
ideological label (of his own making) attached to spiritual life. The
proletarian does and this ideological label has robbed him of
belief in the sustaining value of spiritual values as such. The
finding of a way out of the present chaotic social situation depends
upon a correct insight into this fact. Access to this way has been
closed by the social order which has evolved, along with the new
economic forms, under the influence of the ruling classes. The
strength to open it must be acquired.
There will be a complete change of attitude concerning this subject
when sufficient importance has been attributed to the fact that a
society of men and women in which spiritual life functions as an
ideology lacks one of the forces which makes the social organism
viable. Contemporary society has become ill due to the impotence of
spiritual life and the sickness is aggravated by reluctance to
recognize its existence. By recognizing this fact we would acquire the
foundation on which ideas could be developed which are truly
appropriate to the social movement.
The proletarian believes that he touches on one of his soul's basic
strengths when he talks of class consciousness. The truth, however, is
that ever since he has been harnessed to the capitalistic economic
order he has been seeking a spiritual life, one which can sustain his
soul and make him conscious of his dignity as a human being and
the spiritual life considered to be ideology is not able to develop
this consciousness. He has sought this consciousness, and when he
could not find it he substituted the concept of class consciousness.
His gaze is directed exclusively towards economic factors, as though
drawn there by a powerfully suggestive force. He therefore no longer
believes that the impetus necessary to accomplish something positive
in the social field can be found anywhere else. He believes that only
the evolution of the unspiritual, soulless economic life can bring
about conditions which he feels correspond to human dignity. He is
therefore forced to seek his salvation in the transformation of
economic life. He is forced to conclude that through the
transformation of economic life all the injuries will disappear which
derive from private enterprise, from the individual employer's egotism
and inability to satisfy the employees' demands for human dignity.
Thus the modern proletariat has come to see the only remedy for the
social organism in the transfer of all privately owned means of
production to community operation or even community property. This
opinion was possible because we have diverted our attention from
spiritual forces and concentrated solely on the economic process.
This is the source of the contradictory elements in the proletarian
movement. The modern proletarian believes that he will attain to his
rights as a human being through developments in the economic field. He
is fighting for these rights. And yet, in the process something
appears which could never be the result of economic activities alone.
This phenomenon, which is thought to be the consequence of economic
factors alone, is a very salient feature of the social question. It is
a process which follows a direct line of development from ancient
slavery through the serfdom of the middle ages and up to the modern
proletariat. The circulation of commodities and money, the realities
of capital, real estate, private property and so forth, are all
elements of modern life. A characteristic of contemporary society
which is not clearly identified, not even consciously recognized by
the proletarian but which constitutes the fundamental impulse for his
social will, is that the modern capitalistic economic order, within
its own sphere of activity, recognizes only commodities and their
respective values. Within this capitalistic organism something has
become a commodity which the proletarian feels may not be a commodity.
The modern proletarian abhors instinctively, unconsciously, the fact
that he must sell his labour power to his employer in the same way
that commodities are sold in the market-place, and that the law of
supply and demand plays its role in determining the value of his
labour power just as it does in determining the value of commodities.
This abhorrence of the commodity nature of labour power has a profound
meaning in the social movement. Not even the socialist theories
emphasize this point radically enough. This is the second element
which makes the social question so urgent; the first being the
conviction that spiritual life is an ideology.
In antiquity there were slaves. The whole person was sold like a
commodity. Somewhat less of him, but a substantial part of the human
being nonetheless, was incorporated into the economic process by
serfdom. Capitalism is the force which persists in giving a commodity
nature to a portion of the human being: his labour power. I do not
mean to imply that this has not been recognized. On the contrary, it
is recognized as a fact of fundamental importance in the modern social
movement. Nevertheless, it is considered to be of an economic nature,
and the question of the commodity nature of labour power is therewith
turned solely into a question of economics. It is erroneously believed
that solutions will be found in economic factors through which the
proletarian will cease to consider the incorporation of his labour
power in society as unworthy of human dignity. How modern economic
forms evolved historically and how they gave human labour power
commodity character is understood. What is not understood is that it
is inherent in economic life that everything incorporated into it must
take on the nature of a commodity. It is not possible to divest human
labour power of its commodity character without first finding a means
of extracting it from the economic process. Efforts should therefore
not be directed towards transforming the economic process so that
human labour power is justly treated within it, but towards extracting
labour power from the economic process and integrating it with social
forces which will relieve it of its commodity character. The
proletarian yearns for an economic life in which his labour power can
assume its rightful place. He does so because he does not see that the
commodity character of his labour power is the result of his being
totally harnessed to the economic process. Due to the fact that he
must deliver up his labour power to the economic process, he
necessarily delivers up himself along with it. The economic process,
by its very nature, tends to utilize labour power in the most
expedient manner and will continue to do so as long as labour
regulation remains one of its functions. As though hypnotized by the
power of modern economics, all eyes are focused on what it alone can
accomplish. However, the means through which labour power no longer
need be a commodity will not be found in this direction. A different
economic form will only convert labour power into a commodity in a
different way. The labour question cannot be properly integrated into
the social question until it is recognized that the production,
distribution and consumption of commodities are determined by
interests which should not extend to human labour power.
The thinking of our times has not learned to differentiate between two
essentially different functions in economic life: on the one hand
labour power, which is intimately associated with the human being, and
on the other hand the production-distribution-consumption process,
which essentially is not. Should sound thinking along these lines make
manifest the true nature of the labour question, then this same type
of thinking will indicate the position economic life is to assume in a
healthy social organism.
It is already apparent that the social question may be
conceived of as three particular questions. The first pertains to the
healthy form spiritual-cultural life should assume in the social
organism, the second deals with the just integration of labour power
in the life of the community and the third concerns the way the
economy should function within this community.
Last Modified: 02-Nov-2024
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